Archives for category: Scandals
Newer Entries »

Pennsylvania: Cyber School Kingpin Gets Light Sentence for Stealing Millions and Not Reporting It on His Income Tax Forms

By dianeravitch
July 27, 2018 //
12

I have been waiting for the sentencing of Nicholas Trombetta for years, ever since he was arrested for tax evasion after not reporting the millions of dollars he stole from his cyber charter, the first such in the state of Pennsylvania.

Steven Singer reports the sentencing here, and he is outraged that Trombetta got a slap on the wrist, as compared to the long jail sentences meted out to Atlanta teachers who changed test scores.

What Steven doesn’t understand is that Trombetta was sentenced for tax evasion, not for embezzlement of millions of dollars. Embezzlement of public funds was not an issue, although it should have been. Apparently it is okay to steal from the state as long as you report it on your tax returns. Some of the embezzlement occurred by setting up shell companies with which Trombetta did business with himself, using public money. Watch for the “related companies” when following the money.

Steven writes:

Nick Trombetta stole millions of dollars from Pennsylvania’s children.

And he cheated the federal government out of hundreds of thousands in taxes.

Yet at Tuesday’s sentencing, he got little more than a slap on the wrist – a handful of years in jail and a few fines.

He’ll serve 20 months in prison, be on supervised release for three years, and payback the tax money he concealed.

As CEO and founder of PA Cyber, the biggest virtual charter school network in the state, he funneled $8 million into his own pocket.

Instead of that money going to educate kids, he used it to buy a Florida condominium, sprawling real estate and even a private jet.

He already took home between $127,000 and $141,000 a year in salary.

But it wasn’t enough.

He needed to support his extravagant lifestyle, buy a $933,000 condo in the Sunshine State, score a $300,000 twin jet plane, purchase $180,000 houses for his mother and girlfriend in Ohio, and horde a pile of cash.

What does a man like that deserve for stealing from the most vulnerable among us – kids just asking for an education?

At very least, you’d think the judge would throw the book at him.

But no.

Categories Accountability, Fraud, Pennsylvania, Scandals, Virtual Charter Schools

Tom Ultican: D.C. Reform is a Mighty Fraud

By dianeravitch
March 7, 2018 //
11

 

Ever since D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty took control of the D.C.public schools and named Michelle Rhee as its leader, corporate reformers have hailed the long-struggling district as a model of school reform. Rhee was a blazing meteor in the world of reform, appearing on the covers of national magazines and as a frequent guest on national TV. She starred in “Waiting for ‘Superman,’” and prominent reform-loving journalists burbled in print about her miraculous achievements.

She “knew” that “bad teachers” caused low student test scores, so she set about firing teachers and principals and designed an evaluation system tied to test scores to weed out the bad apples.

Her stle was mean. She gloried in her lack of empathy and her contempt for collaboration.

Now, Tom Ultican (like John Merrow before him, whom he cites) dismantles the Rhee legacy as a fraud, an exemplar of the Destroy Public Education Movement, a testament to the failure of the “portfolio model.”

Inflated test scores, inflated graduation rates, doctored data, a regime of deception and boasting. A model of corporate reform. Educators in Atlanta were sentenced to jail for the same things that happened in D.C. yet D.C. was hailed as a model.

Rhee is gone. Her successor Kaya Henderson is gone. Her successor Antwan Wilson is gone. But the hype and spin survives. When will the Mayor and City Council and people of D.C demand accountability?

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reform, Data, District of Columbia, Education Reform, Fraud, Rhee, Michelle, Scandals

D.C. Critic: Investigation of Graduation Rates Did Not Include Charter Schools

By dianeravitch
February 8, 2018 //
10

 

Here is a curiosity. The recent investigation of graduation rates in the D.C. Public Schools–which revealed that one-third of the graduates lacked the minimum qualifications to graduate–did not include charter schools. Nearly half the students in the D.C. schools attend charter schools.  Why were they not included in the investigation?

D.C.’s answer to the scandal is to create an “Office of Integrity.” Former teacher Erich Martel says that is not enough because such an office would be subservient to the authorities creating and covering up the scandal.

He writes:

 

Council Education Committee Chairman and Members, Council Members,

(Council staff: Please print the attachment for your CM, thank you)

 

DCPS chancellor Antwan Wilson’s proposed “Office of Integrity” is inadequate because it is not independent of the education hierarchy that ignored it for years.  Teachers and school staff will not trust any office that is within the DCPS bureaucracy.  And, it doesn’t cover charter schools, voucher recipients, college funding recipients or home schools.

 

The bill before the MD state legislature calling for an Investigator General under a proposed “Education Monitoring Unit” that is INDEPENDENT of the state education hierarchy with an independent funding stream is a far better alternative, more likely to fulfill its intended function. 

 

It has to have investigative powers with full due process protections as the proposed MD bill spells out.

 

Alternatives for DC might be:

An education investigator general (or whatever name) under the DC Inspector General,  DC auditor, with authority over DCPS, DC charters, DC voucher recipient schools, DC college funding recipients and home schools.

 

And – I am waiting for the Council to conduct an independent audit of DC charters’ graduates compliance with attendance requirements and fulfillment of graduation requirements.

 

Erich Martel

Retired DCPS high school teacher

Ward 3

ehmartel@starpower.net

Categories District of Columbia, Graduation rates, Scandals

Rochester, New York: Developer of Gulen School Pockets $300,00 Profit in Sweet Deal

By dianeravitch
December 11, 2017 //
10

One of the biggest scandals associated with charter school finances has to do with “related parties.” That means that the school engages in financial transactions with a “related party” and money changes hands and ends up in the pockets of friends.

The Gulen schools are one of the nations’ largest charter chains. They are somehow associated or owned by the imam Fethullah Gulen, who lives in seclusion in the Poconos of Pennsylvania. General Michael Flynn apparently offered to extradite Gulen because the Turkish Government blames Gulen for a failed coup. Gulen schools have been accused of hiring Turkish contractors who were not the low bidders on contracts. You can tell a Gulen Charter by the large number of Turks on the board of directors and Turkish teachers.

In Rochester, New York, the local newspaper has uncovered a shady deal between related parties involving a Gulen charter school.

The story reads in part:

“A real estate holding company based in Syracuse cleared more than $300,000 in profit at the expense of a charter school in Greece earlier this year, according to real estate and financial records obtained by the Democrat and Chronicle.

“Both the company, Terra Science and Education Inc., and Rochester Academy Charter School, which opened in 2008 as the first local charter high school, have evident connections with each other, and broadly with the nebulous network of Fethullah Gulen, the reclusive and controversial Turkish cleric living in exile in rural Pennsylvania.

“Both the school and Terra deny there is a connection, but the D&C investigation has found numerous examples of overlapped personnel, lax invoicing, a lack of auditing and shared community affiliations.

“Many Gulen-suspected schools across the country have entered into questionable real estate transactions with related parties, something critics label an attempt to siphon off the public money charter schools receive for their pupils. The importance for Monroe County residents, though, is the disbursal of hundreds of thousands of public dollars to a connected organization.

“Such transactions, while not illegal, point to an oversight weakness in charter schools, which rely more heavily on contracted space and services than traditional public schools.

“The Democrat and Chronicle has rebuilt the timeline of the deal that generated the substantial return for Terra.

*May 2016: Terra Science and Education Inc. buys a shuttered school building on Latta Road from Our Mother of Sorrows Church for $700,000.

*August 2016 to June 2017: Terra spends between $1.2 million and $1.5 million in renovations. Rochester Academy Charter School (RACS) leases the building from Terra in the meantime for $30,000 a month, paying a total of $300,000.

*June 2017: RACS purchases the newly renovated building for $2.5 million — at least $300,000 more than Terra’s costs for purchase and renovation, not including the lease payments.

“The fat profit margin for Terra comes from public funding intended for the hundreds of students attending the school — about $5 million in 2016-17, and growing as the school adds grade levels each year.

“Under normal circumstances, if a developer turned a $300,000 profit after owning a property less than one year and selling it to a public school, it would be evidence of ruthless commercial skill for the one party and hapless poor luck for the other.

“When there is evidence the two parties are connected, it is a different story.”

Bottom line: Taxpayers were ripped off.

Categories Gulen Charter Schools, New York, Scandals

Mercedes Schneider: Sex Scandal at New Orleans Charter School

By dianeravitch
October 5, 2017 //
11

There is an inherent problem with privatizing and deregulating publicly-funded schools. Without supervision, without oversight, without accountability, bad things may happen. And they may not be noticed unless there is a whistle-blower, because that’s what happens in the absence of oversight.

Mercedes Schneider reports here on a sex scandal in a New Orleans Charter School.

“It baffled me when I read that administration at a New Orleans charter school, Success Preparatory Academy, failed to immediately alert police regarding a cell phone video of a sexual incident that happened on campus in April 2017.

“School admin are mandated reporters of sexual abuse.

“However, what really sealed the deal for the two administrators arrested is their apparent ignorance that deleting the video from a student’s phone constitutes destroying evidence, and emailing the video– one that falls under the definition of child pornography– to oneself and to another administrator– constitutes possession of child pornography.

“But there is more:

“When made aware of the incident, the principal of the school also failed to report it to the police, and he publicly defends the failure to report the incident to police as well as the decision of the other admin to delete the video from the student’s phone; return that phone to the student, and email the pornographic video to herself and another admin.”

Do sex scandals happen in public schools? Yes. But they are likely to be reported because there is oversight and supervision, and because teachers know that they are mandated to report such cases.

A student was forced to perform sex acts in a bathroom. The student’s mother reported the incident to the police, and the school’s administrators were arrested.

“According to the Advocate, all three administrators (Gangopadhyay, Kusmirek, and Shane) hail from Teach for America. As administrators of a K-8 Louisiana school, all should have been well aware that they are mandated reporters of “the involvement of the child in any sexual act with… any other person… or the aiding of the child’s involvement in any sexual act with any other person [or] …pornographic displays.”

Maybe they didn’t learn that in their five weeks of training.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, New Orleans, Scandals, Students, Teach for America

A Chronology of Ohio’s Recent Charter School Scandals

By dianeravitch
April 27, 2017 //
7

Progress Ohio has compiled a list of recent charter school scandals, covering only the past four years. Someone should take on the job of making the list comprehensive. But this is long enough.

This is an industry wracked with self-dealing, profiteering, political pay-offs, fraud, and corruption.

Please read the article and see for yourself.

And the amazing thing is that Arne Duncan’s Department of Education gave Ohio an additional $71 million to open more charter schools, apparently with complete indifference to what was happening on the ground.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Ohio, Privatization, Scandals
Newer Entries »