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ProPublica: The Fraud of For-Profit Charter Schools in Ohio That Run Dropout Recovery Centers

By dianeravitch
October 7, 2017 //
10

ProPublica and USA Today teamed up to conduct an investigation of charter fraud in Ohio (although there is so much charter fraud in Ohio that this piece investigates only one aspect of it).

This story is about dropout recovery centers that collect large sums of money even if the students don’t show up.

It focuses on a “school” run by EdisonLearning, the latest version of the Edison Schools that were launched in the early 1990s with the goal of creating a network of 200 privately run schools.

It begins like this:

Last school year, Ohio’s cash-strapped education department paid Capital High $1.4 million in taxpayer dollars to teach students on the verge of dropping out. But on a Thursday in May, students’ workstations in the storefront charter school run by for-profit EdisonLearning resembled place settings for a dinner party where most guests never arrived.

In one room, empty chairs faced 25 blank computer monitors. Just three students sat in a science lab down the hall, and nine more in an unlit classroom, including one youth who sprawled out, head down, sleeping.

Only three of the more than 170 students on Capital’s rolls attended class the required five hours that day, records obtained by ProPublica show. Almost two-thirds of the school’s students never showed up; others left early. Nearly a third of the roster failed to attend class all week.

Some stay away even longer. ProPublica reviewed 38 days of Capital High’s records from late March to late May and found six students skipped 22 or more days straight with no excused absences. Two were gone the entire 38-day period. Under state rules, Capital should have unenrolled them after 21 consecutive unexcused absences.

Though the school is largely funded on a per-student basis, the no-shows didn’t hurt the school’s revenue stream. Capital billed and received payment from the state for teaching the equivalent of 171 students full time in May.

It is yet another charter fraud.

Another reform scam. It is not about “the kids.” It is about the money.

Do legislators care?

Question: How many charter scandals and frauds does it take to get the attention of the Ohio legislature?

Speaking of scandals, ECOT (the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow) has threatened to close its virtual doors if the state doesn’t leave them alone and stop pestering them to provide a real education to real students. No doubt the owner William Lager is bluffing. But if he does close down ECOT, he will do everyone a favor by shutting down the nation’s biggest dropout factory. He has collected more than a billion dollars since he opened ECOT and given only a few millions to Republican (and a few Democratic) politicians (in Ohio, they sell their votes cheaply). How likely is he to walk away from his fabulous money stream?

I dare you! I double-dare you! Close your doors, ECOT! You won’t be missed.

Although the legislators and other elected officials will miss your campaign contributions.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Failure, For-Profit, Ohio, Privatization, Virtual Charter Schools

Ohio: Massive Theft of Public Funds! Legislators Shrug.

By dianeravitch
October 6, 2017 //
9

Bill Phillis of the Ohio Coalition of Equity and Adequacy reports that the Electronoc Classroom of Tomorrow has received $121 million from the Columbus School District, while providing an online program of low quality.

He writes:

“ECOT has drained $121,655,364.35 from one Ohio school district-for what?

“The ECOT business plan puts a heap of money into the private companies involved in this operation. Over the years, considerable wealth has been accumulated by the ECOT Man. Remember that over several years, ECOT has collected a billion dollars on the basis of enrollment and NOT student participation in the “program.”

“According to Ohio Department of Education’s records, one Ohio district -Columbus-has lost $121,655,364.35 since fiscal year 2002. Below is the amount for each year:

2018
$ 10,953,860.82
2017
$ 10,957,796.70
2016
$ 11,744,302.64
2015
$ 11,502,686.27
2014
$ 10,517,410.00
2013
$ 9,326,527.50
2012
$ 8,434,344.51
2011
$ 7,500,623.28
2010
$ 6,582,299.08
2009
$ 6,483,223.11
2008
$ 6,123,801.08
2007
$ 5,864,911.49
2006
$ 5,279,561.93
2005
$ 5,129,842.49
2004
$ 3,671,320.74
2003
n/a
2002
$1,582,852.71

GRAND total:

$ 121,655,364.35

“The state deducts this money from payments to the district. The Board of Education has no control over what happens to the revenue lost or the education of the students involved. Over half of the lost revenue comes from local property tax levied for the operation of the Columbus City School District.

“Now that ECOT is on the ropes, it appears that the Ohio Department of Education will bail it out by granting dropout

recovery status. Thus far, state officials have not developed a plan to correct this travesty.”

How about ECOT refund the money?

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, Ohio, Virtual Charter Schools

Ohio: Low-Performing ECOT Overbilled State by at Least $20 Million Last Year

By dianeravitch
September 29, 2017 //
11

Ohio legislators and the State Department of Education continue to fund the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, despite scandal after scandal.

Phantom students. The lowest graduation rate of any school in the nation.

And now auditors discover that ECOT overbilled the state by another $20 million last year, by inflating the number of students it claimed to enroll.

Read the article to see what an awful “school” this is. Only 2.9% of its graduates earn a college degree within six years.

What an amazing trick can be accomplished with campaign contributions! Ohio officials should be ashamed.

Categories For-Profit, Fraud, Ohio, Virtual Charter Schools

Jan Resseger: Will the Ohio Legislature Have the Courage to Reign in Politically Powerful ECOT?

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
2

Jan Resseger writes here about the fate of legislation that would establish accountability for the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow (ECOT), which is the worst performing school in the state and is owned by one of the biggest donors to Republican politicians.

ECOT has a bad habit of claiming tuition for students who are theoretically enrolled but never turn on their computer. There apparently are thousands of phantom students. The state has attempted to claw back millions of dollars from ECOT but ECOT has fought them in court.

Can William Lager, owner of ECOT, ever be held accountable for his collection of hundreds of millions of dollars from Ohio taxpayers? It will be settled in court. Unfortunately, Lager has contributed to the campaigns of several judges on Ohio’s Supreme Court.

The law needs fixing, to protect students and taxpayers:

Ohio State Senator Joe Schiavoni ought to be a hero to public school teachers and parents—and to citizens who support responsible stewardship of tax dollars. Except that thanks to the power of the Republican leadership in the Ohio legislature, few people are really aware of Schiavoni’s heroic effort to put a stop to Bill Lager’s massive scam—the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow.

Schiavoni is a Democrat and his bill to regulate online charter schools has been pushed aside for over a year now. As Schiavoni explained in testimony last February, “Senate Bill 39 is the updated version of Senate Bill 298 from the last General Assembly.” In March of 2016, Schiavoni first introduced a version of this bill—designed to reign in Bill Lager’s giant scam. ECOT was (and still is) charging the state, which pays charter schools on a per pupil basis, for students who have enrolled at ECOT but are not regularly logging onto their computers to participate in the educational program.

Here is how Schiavoni described the bill (then Senate Bill 298) at that time: “We need to make sure that online schools are accurately reporting attendance and not collecting tax dollars for students who never log in to take classes. Online schools must be held accountable for lax attendance policies. Without strong oversight, these schools could be collecting millions of dollars while failing to educate Ohio’s school children.” Schiavoni’s bill required e-schools to keep accurate records of the number of hours student spend doing coursework. It required online schools to notify the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) if a student failed to log-in for ten consecutive days. It required that a qualified teacher check in with each student once a month to monitor active participation. In the last legislative session, the bill was never fully debated and never brought to the Senate floor for a vote.

Schiavoni re-introduced the bill in February, and this afternoon at 3:15, Peggy Lehner, the chair of the Senate Education Committee, is finally holding a hearing on Schiavoni’s bill. When he testified in February about the bill he was introducing, Schiavoni explained why it is needed: “Other than the requirement that e-schools provide no less than 920 hours per year of learning opportunities, there are no specific statewide standards related to the number of hours per day or week that e-school students must be engaged in learning. In an environment where a teacher is not physically able to see students in a classroom, this lack of accountability is very concerning.”

Schiavoni believes Senate Bill 39 will address the outrageous problems at Ohio’s on-line charter schools: “Senate Bill 39 requires each e-school to keep an accurate record of how long each individual student is actively participating in learning in every 24-hour period. This information must be reported to ODE on a monthly basis, and ODE would be required to make this report available on their website. Senate Bill 39 would also require a teacher who is licensed by the Ohio Department of Education to certify the accuracy of student participation logs… on a monthly basis.”

Categories For-Profit, Fraud, Ohio, Virtual Charter Schools

Ohio: ECOT, the Nation’s Biggest Dropout Factory, Designated as a Dropout Prevention and Recovery Center

By dianeravitch
September 27, 2017 //
15

Are the legislators of Ohio insane? Is the Ohio Department of Education totally corrupt?

Those are some of the questions that come to mind on reading that the state has agreed to designate the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow as a recipient of funding for dropout prevention and recovery center.

ECOT certainly knows a lot about dropouts.

It produces more dropouts than any other “school” in the state of Ohio, more than any other school in the nation.

As Stephen Dyer shows, ECOT performs worse than any other district in the state:

Now that it appears the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow — the state’s largest online school and the nation’s largest producer of high school dropouts — will be classified as a dropout recovery and prevention school (without a hint of irony) by the Ohio Department of Education, it is useful to look at just how dreadful ECOT’s performance has been.

In the 2016-2017 school year, ECOT received $103 million in state money meant for kids in Ohio school districts, but which went instead to ECOT. Not a single penny came from a district that performed worse in more report card categories than ECOT. Only $2,204 of the $103 million came from a district whose performance was the same.

But here’s the amazing stat: More than $25 million of that $103 million came from districts that outperformed ECOT in EVERY SINGLE COMPARABLE REPORT CARD CATEGORY!

That’s right. One out of every 4 dollars going to ECOT comes from a district that in every way outperforms ECOT — the largest single chunk of state funding transfers to the school.

Naturally, the inquiring mind wonders who made this decision. It didn’t just happen. Someone or several someones just sat down and said, how can we shovel more millions of taxpayer dollars to the worst performing virtual charter school in the state? in the nation?

Were they incompetent or corrupt? I leave that to you to decide.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corruption, Education Industry, Privatization, Stupid, Virtual Charter Schools

Ohio: The School That Produces the Most Dropouts Wants to Become a Dropout Recovery Center

By dianeravitch
September 21, 2017 //
9

I know this sounds ridiculous, but remember this is Ohio. In Ohio, the charter industry can get away with almost anything!

Stephen Dyer discovered a study completed in 2013 by researchers at Ohio State University finding that ECOT (the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow) produces more dropouts than any other charter school in the state.

So, naturally, it makes sense (or no sense at all) for ECOT to apply to become a dropout recovery center.

Four years prior to the school’s application to be considered a dropout recovery school this summer, the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow — the state’s oldest and largest online school — was found to be Ohio’s leading producer of high school dropouts while only recovering 1.5 percent of those dropouts.

In a 2013 report completed by Ohio State University’s Education Research Center, the authors concluded that between 2006-2010, ECOT produced 13,000 dropouts, or 21.5 percent of all dropouts in Ohio’s charter schools. In 2010 alone, ECOT had 2,908 dropouts — nearly double the number of the Cleveland Municipal School District’s 1,600. At the time, Cleveland had nearly double the students enrolled as ECOT had, according to the report.

Of its nearly 3,000 dropouts, only 75 returned. Quite a record.

And now the state is considering ECOT’s request to become a dropout recovery and prevention center.

What a farce!

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, Ohio, Privatization, Virtual Charter Schools

Los Angeles County Investigates Enrollment of Catholic School Students in Online Academy

By dianeravitch
September 20, 2017 //
21

This is a new kind of charter school scandal. A virtual school enrolled students already enrolled in Catholic schools and claimed full state tuition. The virtual school gave the Catholic school cash and laptops. Meanwhile, the parents paid tuition to the Catholic school. In effect, the students attended two schools.

Bizarre new world of profit-taking.

http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-edu-lennox-virtual-academy-20170920-story.html

Categories Accountability, Catholic Schools, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Funding, Los Angeles, Privatization, Technology, Virtual Charter Schools

Nancy Bailey: DeVos’ “Let’s Get Rid of Public Schools” Tour

By dianeravitch
September 19, 2017 //
21

Nancy Bailey valiantly followed Betsy DeVos’s national tour, from a distance.

Her message everywhere was the same: Public schools suck! Private schools are awesome!

In public schools, children sit in desks arranged in rows. In private schools, well, maybe the same but it doesn’t matter.

In public schools, children hate going to school. In private schools, they are enthusiastic and happy.

This woman is an ideologue. She knows nothing and learns nothing. Whatever she proposes is meant to damage public schools and communities.

Education is a learning profession, and she is not open to learning anything!

We will wait her out, fight her at every turn, and return to the task of improving and strengthening public schools for all children, a concept unknown to her.

Categories Accountability, Betsy DeVos, Charter Schools, Education Industry, For-Profit, Privatization, School Choice, Virtual Charter Schools, Vouchers

Is School Choice Good for Kids? A Debate Between an Expert and an Ideologue

By dianeravitch
September 17, 2017 //
16

Samuel Abrams, director of the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education, is a hardy soul. He agreed to debate Bob Bowdon, film-maker, pundit, and hater of all things public, in a debate sponsored by the libertarian publication Reason. The debate took place in July but it remains relevant.

Sam taught for many years in the New York City public schools, then wrote his academic thesis on the Edison Project, which grew into a book about for-profit education ventures called Education and the Commercial Mindset, published by Harvard University Press. The book is thoughtful, well-documented, and scholarly.

Bob Bowdon is a film-maker who made a name for himself as someone who despises public schools, teachers, and unions. He is a libertarian, and the crowd was with him from the start. Abrams was brave to go before a pro-choice crowd, and he won some of them over to the idea that there is actually something called the common good.

Bowdon, needless to say, is unfamiliar with the research about vouchers, and is unaware of research from Ohio, Indiana, Louisiana, and D.C. showing that students who take vouchers lose ground as compared to their peers who stay in public schools.

Here is a transcript of the debate.

Categories Charter Schools, Privatization, School Choice, Virtual Charter Schools, Vouchers

Bill Phillis: Ohio Allows ECOT to Spend $33 Million on Ads, Lobbying, Lawsuits, and Profits

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2017 //
11

Bill Phillis, watchdog extraordinaire for Ohio, reports that the state of Ohio has allowed the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow (ECOT) to use public money in its public relations blitz to avoid accountability for inflation of enrollment and the state’s efforts to claw back more than $60 million. ECOT is notable for having the lowest graduation rate of any high school in the nation, as well as dubious quality standards. Its founder is a major contributor to elected officials. In return, he has collected many millions of dollars of profit.

Bill Phillis writes:

“ECOT has spent $33 million on ads, lobbyists, profits and lawsuits
since January 2016

“According to a September 3 Columbus Dispatch article, ECOT has spent $33 million on TV ads, lobbyists, lawsuits and William Lager’s for-profit companies since January 2016, all in pursuit of gaining state approval to continue to count students that are not participating.

“Over 400 school buses could have been purchased with the $33 million ECOT has spent recklessly. While Ohio students ride on worn-out buses, the ECOT Man spent money extracted from school districts to rev-up his tax-consuming machine.

“It is amazing that public officials have tolerated payments to ECOT’s for students not participating during a span of 15 years. Now that ECOT has finally been audited and exposed, this business is in the process of submitting a plan to transition to the totally unregulated dropout recovery charter scheme.

“Will state officials allow this duplicity to proceed? This will be an ethical and moral test for state officials and the Ohio Department of Education.”

You can contact Bill Phillis or join his organization at:

William L. Phillis
Ohio Coalition for Equity & Adequacy of School Funding
614.228.6540
ohioeanda@sbcglobal.net
http://www.ohiocoalition.org

Categories Failure, For-Profit, Ohio, Online Education, Virtual Charter Schools
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