US News & World Report and Newsweek ranked BASIS charter schools in Arizona as the best high schools in the nation, without noting their dramatic attrition rates and demographics that heavily favor whites and Asians.
But a new audit shows that BASIS is in deep financial trouble.
“The globally renowned BASIS charter school system is nearly $44 million in the red, according to a recent report from a Phoenix-based watchdog group.
“The international charter chain, whose first campus opened in Tucson in 1998, lost nearly $12 million in net assets last fiscal year alone, according to an analysis from Arizonans for Charter School Accountability. BASIS rejects the report’s findings.
“Jim Hall, the accountability organization’s founder, generated the report based on audit documents available on the Arizona State Board for Charter Schools’ website. The Arizona Daily Star confirmed the deficit claims independently with the charter board audit.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Don’t they call these “loss leaders” in “bizness”? I’m sure the outstanding results BASIS gets with every student who they are randomly assigned to teach — just those typical poor kids who would otherwise be stuck in a failing public school — will cause some billionaires to provide many millions in donations and the US Dept. of Education to give them some taxpayer-funded grants to reward them for their “excellence”.
Even if they close for bankruptcy, the money paid to the for-profit and the high salaries to administrators took from the schools will stay in their hands.
The for-profit corporation, which operates andowns the schools, pays itself $10 million a year. Good business.
Absolutely!
According to education reformers, schools should be run like businesses and as long as the people who “own” the schools are happy, that tells ed reformers that all is good.
Running a school for the benefit of its students is like running a business for the benefit of the workers there. It’s a no-no as all the education reformers who push market-driven reforms understand.
Market-driven reform. It means that the students and employees aren’t important — but if the owners can make a profit for a while and then shut down, it’s all good.
It is about time that some of these schools that pay outlandish salaries, overcharge for leasing deals and pull out too much profit get caught in their own scheme.
Lost nearly $12 million in net assets last fiscal year alone?
What does this mean? They lost their printers? Computers? Mercedes? Buildings?
Hmm, I wonder where the assets went.
Maybe someone should check the lost and found.
Or their Swiss bank accounts.
I can sympathize, I’m always losing things – my keys, my phone, my $12 million in assets. Oh, wait, not that last one….
I wonder if this remediation in college has to do with the common gore, high stakes testing, and online everything?
https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/co/2019/03/21/phasing-out-remedial-college-education-could-help-more-colorado-students-earn-their-degrees/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=cb_bureau_colorado
It is obvious that the goal of BASIS Charter School’s CEO/management is to milk this cash cow until the cow stops giving milk and then close those schools and move on while taking as much of that cash with them as they can illegally get away with.
Previous court cases of Charter School fraud show that the fines and penalties seldom if ever match the total they stole, and the individuals found guily move on to another state and another city and repeat the same crime.
And if the crooks earn some prison time, they end up in a country club prison for white collar criminals. When they get out, they usually have millions of those stole dollars still in their bank accounts because of the inadequate fines.