Some charter schools are like day lilies–they open, they close. Charter advocates say that their instability is a feature, not a bug. They decry the public schools that serve families for generations. Better to have market forces at work. Then you get a situation like the one in Fort Myers, Florida.
The Lee County school board yanked the authorization from the Collegiate Charter School after district staff found serious disorder: overflowing trash bins, kids walking around unsupervised, and only two teachers running the whole operation. District staff said they didn’t know who was working in the school. When staff visited the school, they found two teachers responsible for three classrooms. How do you do that? One teacher responded that she stands between the two classes. This is apparently innovative teaching, but the school board didn’t think so.
The charter was approved last April, even though it did not yet have a facility. That’s what the law says. Just approve the charter and see what happens.
Choice advocates always said that parents know best. Why would parents put their children into a school that is understaffed and chaotic?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“We approved a school that we didn’t have a facility address to, and apparently that’s kind of common, and I was like how does that happen?” said Giovannelli.
Cannady answered her question in the meeting.
“They are able to open and have their application approved without the facility being selected, and I think that’s a statutory thing,” said Cannady.”
And all of ed reform holds up Florida as the model for their privatization approach. 100% agreement in the echo chamber, as usual.
They’re never going to regulate these schools. Their ideology forbids regulating these schools and that’s expressed in the state codes they write, where the school board is ordered to approve a charter that doesn’t even have an address.
Ed reformers wrote the charter laws. They designed these regulatory schemes. 100% an ed reform project. They designed them not to provide any real regulation. If they wanted to regulate the private contractors that run the schools they would have done so when their lobbyists drafted the state charter laws- they did not want them regulated.
I would ask “where’s the authorizer?” but I live in Ohio, so I know authorizing is just rent seeking and skimming off the public school dollar. It’s a phony regulatory mechanism.
As near as I can figure out, school districts are still the only valid authorizers/ sponsors in Florida. There was a 2019 house bill to include public colleges & universities but it died in senate ed committee.
This is just about the only good thing I’ve heard about FL charter law. When the local school district is accountable, there’s at least a faint chance they’ll hear & respond quickly when word gets around about an outrageous situation like this one.
Public schools offer stability and community with services by professional teachers. Florida’s reckless free market policies treat students like commodities. Public money gets transferred out of the public schools and into the pocket of privateers that often have no vision or plan. Communities need to realize that opening charter schools is a disinvestment in the local community. Public schools enhance the value of local communities, but privatization sends public money to corporations outside the community. We will never hear most Florida politicians reveal this true impact on local dollars. Florida offers very little oversight and accountability of free market charters, and this is why it is a playground for grifters that feed on tax dollars.
offering very little oversight and accountability…..while the big money flows in
I live in Fort Myers. The district is being squeezed for funds to the point of no return. Low bandwidth makes virtual ed. a nightmare along with so many teachers having to do hybrid teaching. It is a mess. How many taxpayer dollars have been squandered on this pathetic attempt to usurp traditional schools? Our school board was negligent. And once again the teachers and students suffer.
Parents do not know best? What they know is based on what they know and if the ADS for a private sector, charter school are misleading and make outrageous impossible promises, then the data the parents have is tainted and so is their decision making.
Also, I want to suggest a switch from the day lilly to the castor oil plant, the most poisonous in the world. The flower on this plant is all red and sort of looks like the image of the COVID-19 virus.
Other options are the predatory pitcher plant or the corpse flower.
Shouldn’t the accountability be on the publicly elected school board and the district administration for approving the opening of the school without a facility or not properly vetting and supervising staff? Sounds to me like there wasn’t any oversight on the part of the authorizing district. They set the school up for failure by not doing their job.
When Chicago had Chicago only congressional districts (prior to the 1992 remaps), now Former Congresspeople Tim Sheehan, Roman Pucinski, Frank Annunzio, Dan Rostenkowski, Dan Lipinski and Marty Russo were all flapping their gums about school vouchers. Catholic schools were implied, but a few Lutheran schools and secular schools existed then (and still do somewhat). Oddly, congresspeople really can’t promise vouchers, which would have to be nationwide. It would be difficult to have nationwide vouchers, for so many reasons. Even if they could deliver vouchers, the number of Catholic and Lutheran schools has greatly decreased. 🤔😮
As a Black Man, I’m curious how Chicago Public Schools and Urban Prep Charter are allowed to have Black Male only schools. Urban Prep advertises officially as male only schools, but the reality is most White Male, Hispanic Male, Asian Male and Indigenous Male students aren’t enrolling in these south side schools, for racial, travel and safety reasons. In various promotions, Urban Prep advertises itself as Black Male schools. 🤔😮
I’m curious, how is Urban Prep allowed to do this, when its website lists no discrimination based on race, gender, etc., from itself and Chicago Public Schools? 🤔😮