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Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2005 > July > 25 > Entry
State gives up charter control
By Scott Elliott
Dayton Daily News
Dayton charter schools had their own form of free agency this summer, and on the surface some of the new lineups may seem a little strange. A school board in Toledo now runs 12 public schools here. Another four schools each are run by a Cincinnati orphanage and a Washington, D.C., based nonprofit. As of July 1, the Ohio Department of Education is out of the business of running charter schools directly, a dramatic switch that only Ohio has tried, and that other states are watching carefully. In its place, a few nonprofits like St. Aloysius Orphanage and the Fordham Foundation stepped in, and some school boards, like the Lucas County Educational Service Center, extended their reach. The theory is that the new sponsors will be closer to the schools, more invested in their success and therefore better at monitoring them. But striking the right balance between regulation and freedom already has proved tricky. Charter schools are free, taxsupported public schools that operate independently. For each student who enrolls, about $6,000 in state aid is routed from the school district to the charter school. When Ohio passed a law permitting charters in 1997, the law allowed only the state and local school boards to sponsor. But few schools boards were interested, leaving the state in charge of nearly all charters in the first five years. With a crush of new education prospectors in the late 1990s, Ohio’s charter community was filled with frontier town bustle, but lacked a sheriff. A charter school oversight office wasn’t even begun until a year into the program and as the number of charters grew to 100 statewide, their test performance lagged and several schools closed with financial and management problems. In 2002, then-state auditor Jim Petro called in the cavalry. His scathing report urged lawmakers to take sponsorship away from the education department. Led by Jon Husted, R-Kettering, the legislature gave the department a July 1 deadline for this summer to switch sponsorship to school boards, universities or nonprofits. “The problem in the past was they were both the sponsor, in charge of helping schools be successful, and the oversight or the accountability arm,� Husted said. “It was an awkward position of being two masters.� The department now must approve the sponsors, verifying that they have money, a management plan and a track record of success. “I don’t know of any other situation in the country in which a charter system was set up one way and completely changed to another,� said Nelson Smith, president of the Charter School Leadership Council. Smith’s group, a national alliance of charter interests, counts 25 percent of states with charter laws that allow only school districts to sponsor, and another 25 percent that allow only the state to do so. “There’s a lot of interest from states that only allow school districts to sponsor, that are looking for other options,� he said. “Ohio is certainly ahead of the curve.� With the state stepping back, Ohio’s 225 charter schools each joined with one of 34 sponsors. Most sponsors are school boards, including several county service centers. One of them — Toledo’s Lucas County Educational Service Center — instantly became a huge charter sponsor, signing up more than 100 schools. With 12 schools in the Dayton district, Lucas County’s center is now the second biggest operator of public schools in the district after Dayton Public Schools. Charter school chief Jim George said the center believes in expanding choice. “Schools came to us and we looked for the ones that were offering the right quality of education for students to enhance the movement,� he said. Charter critics, including the Ohio Federation of Teachers and some Democrats, have taken on Lucas County in recent weeks and its superintendent, Tom Baker, resigned this month. The legislature also added rules targeting the Lucas County center, requiring it to step down to sponsoring no more than 50 charters. Lucas County opened six schools in Dayton over the past year, fueling another burst of charter growth in the nation’s No. 1 charter school city. With 33 charters, Dayton has the most of any Ohio district. Seven online schools and six charters in nearby cities also have signed up Dayton students, bringing the total charter enrollment to 6,400. That equals 38 percent of Dayton Public Schools’ 16,552 enrollment, and 20 percent of the district’s 33,000 school children. Both percentages are highest in the United States. At the same time the sponsoring changes that made it easier for charters to open, the state and school districts found it harder to track them, which sparked confusion. Dayton school officials were floored in March when state education officials said 23 new charters were coming this fall. But it’s now clear many of the schools were mistakenly listed. The Dayton Daily News could find only one school from that list with a plan to open. Steve Burigana, the education department’s chief operating officer, said sponsors haven’t always kept the state updated. “We really didn’t have any direct knowledge of the intent to open schools until we received notice of charter,� he said. “We considered that to be somewhat problematic.� Burigana said the budget bill has answers for these problems. Starting next year, schools must notify the state in the spring if they intend to open in the fall. As this school year begins, the newest charter players — nonprofits — now must see how their teams perform. Terry Ryan, vice president of the Fordham Foundation, said his group sought to convince other nonprofits to take a swing in the education arena, but when they all backed off, Fordham itself stepped up. The foundation was founded in Dayton but now serves as a national advocate for school choice in Washington, D.C. It will sponsor four Dayton schools among 13 total. Its contracts with schools range from 15 months to five years, and the foundation charges a sponsorship fee ranging from 0.5 percent to 3 percent of per pupil income, based on test scores. Fordham shopped for schools with excellence test results or high potential, Ryan said. For Mike McCormick, superintendent of four Richard Allen charters in Dayton, that chain’s marriage to St. Aloysius might seem natural. McCormick used to be the superintendent of Catholic schools in Dayton. But the connection came through a former state charter school evaluator now with the orphanage. “We looked around a lot,� Mc-Cormick said. “St. Aloysius sees charter schools as an extension of its mission to serve the needs of children. It’s a good fit.� Contact Scott Elliott at 225-2485.
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