$4 m for charter: tax dollars at work
San Diego school shouldn't be on failing list
Doug McRae did not endear himself with the state Department of Education when he suggested that several schools receiving School Improvement Grants should be given “Golden Fleece” awards as public rip-offs.
But McRae, a retired education testing executive from Monterey and a contributor to this blog, knows of what he speaks. After the Department finally posted the revised applications of the 92 low-performing schools that received $416 million in SIG money, McRae went over the 146-page application of a Golden Fleece nominee and alerted me as to what he found.
Sure enough, it’s hard to fathom how state officials could recommend – and the State Board of Education could approve – $4 million for King-Chavez Arts Academy, a tiny, 131-student charter school in San Diego. That they did points to the need for a review of the whole SIG process to avoid squandering money if the feds again offer big bucks to improve the supposedly worst schools. The selection criteria, which the Legislature meddled with, were flawed. The state’s rules for parceling out the money were inflexible. And the State Board of Education’s approval was largely pro forma. All in all, a bad combination.
McRae believes that several other small schools and, in San Francisco Unified’s case, the district office, ended up getting way more than they should have – to the tune of about $25 million. Add to that $70 million going to schools that were not among the lowest performing 10 percent of schools, and it’s close to $100 million, or a quarter of the total for California, that was imprudently allocated.
And it could have been worse. Had Los Angeles Unified and Oakland Unified not complained loudly that all of their schools had been denied money, prompting the state to make room for them, some tiny schools might have gotten $6 million in SIG dollars. King-Chavez had sought $5 million before state officials belatedly capped its grant at $4 million.
Don’t blame King-Chavez for going for the money. The school’s CEO made clear that he didn’t think it should be on the list of persistently lowest performing schools. But give it credit for coming up with some creative ways to spend all that cash over the next three years.
King-Chavez Arts Academy, serving students in grades three through five, is one of three small charter schools that were formed when failing King Elementary in San Diego Unified chose to convert to a charter school in 2005 to serve low-income, minority families. All three operate under the same roof under the management of the charter operator, King-Chavez Public Schools. The other two academies, King-Chavez Primary Academy, for kindergarten through second grades, and King-Chavez Athletics Academy, for other students in grades three through five, have made impressive progress. It’s been less so for King-Chavez Arts. In 2004-05, the last year as a San Diego Unified school, King Elementary had an abysmal 559 API. By 2008-09, the K-2 charter had risen to 815, 256 points higher; the Athletics Academy had an impressive 754 API. Even the Arts Academy, at 657, had risen 98 points.
But due to a quirk in accountability rules, the starting point for the Arts Academy was its 2005-06 score of 631. The school went through turbulence in 2008, when it replaced the principal and the entire teaching staff. Because its 2008-09 score – 17 points below the year before – hadn’t gained 50 points in three years, it was eligible for a SIG grant. (This year’s score, reflecting that changes have taken hold, rebounded to 708, 51 points higher, but that didn’t affect the application.)
That’s the background as to why it qualified. How will it spend this embarrassment of riches? According to the application, $2.7 million will be spent at the school, with nine teachers and a principal, and $1.1 million will go to the charter operator for the three schools.
At the school, additional personnel costs, spread over three years, will total $1.1 million and include $375,000 for bonus incentives for teachers and the principal; $75,000 for mentor teacher stipends; $367,000 for an instructional coach, behavioral aide, and teachers aide; and $268,000 for hourly stipends for extended days and summer and Saturday sessions. Throw in $142,000 for library, arts, and general supplies; $140,000 for musical instruments and theater equipment; $364,000 for computers and technology; $84,000 for field trips; and $667,000 for professional development contracts, standards integration, and artist-in-residence, for an additional $1.5 million.
For its $1.4 million, the small King-Chavez charter management will add a half-time education director, a full-time staff development director, a half-time new teacher support director, a half-time technology director, a full-time administrative assistant, and two more half-time aides.
The Department of Ed did vet the application and assigned it to a review panel. But it took the position that, extravagance notwithstanding, the state could not determine the size of the SIG grant based on student enrollment. Eventually, it modified that decision somewhat, but not enough to prevent excessive amounts for some small schools.
The State Board was supposed to set aside a quarter of the $416 million as a reserve for the dozens of schools on the qualifying list that didn’t apply this year. But it used up the reserve, with the feds’ permission, to fund fully the 92 on the list. King-Chavez’s gain will be another low-performing school’s loss.
The SIG grants is the last item on the agenda for this week’s two-day meeting of the State Board of Education, which starts tomorrow. That’s a sign that the issue won’t get the frank discussion it deserves.
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I could not agree more with Doug and John’s analysis. The only thing I’d add is that the State Board’s vote was not “pro forma” as John says. I attempted to introduce a motion to exclude all charter schools — including King/Chavez — from the SIG grants. It is beyond absurd that we would reward low-performing charter schools with millions in SIG grants, rather than just shutting them down. But when I attempted to do that, I was told by CDE staff that if we did that, we could invalidate all SIG grants for all schools in California — over $400 million dollars. Because of the timing of the vote (and because there were only six board members at that meeting), all of us ended up voting yes. But just to be clear — I attempted to exclude all charters from the SIG grants, and other board members were supportive. It was CDE that explicitly advised us that we had no legal authority to do so. Please check the minutes.
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Ben Austin is correct. The CDE advice in response to Ben’s motion at the Aug 24 meeting was perplexing in that CA’s approved application for SIG funds stated “Persistently low-achieving charter schools that do not select the School Closure Intervention Model must clarify how the intervention selected will create a significantly different instructional model and school culture.” [CA SIG application page 8 of 142 as found on the ED website and quoted in the handout for my public comment on this issue on Aug 24] This sentences signals additional scrutiny for SIG applications from charter schools, which would have provided support for Ben’s motion. Also perplexing was CDE advice that the SBE had to approve the SIG awards “before the first day of school” at the Aug 2 as well as Aug 24 meetings on this topic. It made sense that the interventions to be implemented had to be in place by the first day of school, but the bureaucratic process of dollar approvals and award letters sadly often takes place after-the-fact . . . . . as witnessed by the CA budget process . . . . . in fact, CA’s SIG award letters to LEAs were mailed on September 30.
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….. No Charter Left Behind
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Doug is correct on this an many other issues. He is especially insightful on assessment its strengths and weaknesses. It is a shame that we waste the limited resources we have in this manner. As for Ben Austin he and his fellow Board members should have known better and they should be ashamed. The federal law does not state you cannot consider student enrollment it just says you cannot simply had out the bucks based on student counts. But you can look at program and have criteria that 90% of all funds should be spent at the school level and the like. The State Board has its own staff and they cannot just shag this off on the Department Staff. John Mockler
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I’d like to talk to knowledgeable people here in my district, San Francisco Unified, to find out their take on our district’s SIG money. But what’s the take of our politically/fiscally savvy posters on that? I understand that we had a higher PROPORTION (not number) of SIG schools than other urban districts, and though SFUSD is the highest-achieving of California’s urban districts, it also has a fierce achievement gap, though I think there are demographics-related reasons for that myself.
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Info posted on the Oakland parents’ listserve:
Per King-Chavez Arts Academy’s 990 for 2009 – their CEO makes $176,900 per year (wonder if he’ll get a raise this year). They paid Charter School Management Corporation almost a quarter of a million dollars ($234,450) in 2009 for back office support. Interestingly, they also paid $203,666 to “Freedom and Industry at 2410 Mount Elena, Jamul, CA” $ for “var prof. svcs.” Looks to me like 2410 Mount Elena Way is a house (although the zip code provided in the 990 doesn’t match the city): http://www.redfin.com/CA/Jamul/2410-Mount-Elena-Way-91935/home/6108932 Wonder who made such a good living working from home providing “var. prof svsc” to King-Chavez Arts Academy in 990?
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It’s astounding that these operators are running obvious swindles and just getting away with it, in the full sunshine, enabled and empowered by the SBOE.
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The school should give the money back.
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And if the school doesn’t give it back, its chartering agency should force it to…
Of course, it assumes that the Counties perform any sort of meaningful oversight of the schools they’re chartering.
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I was the Oakland school board member who attended both sessions of the board. I want to thank Ben and his colleagues for hearing our pleas, and for delaying the decision so that Oakland and LA could be considered. It’s actually one of the few board meetings I’ve attended where I felt that my public participation really made a difference!
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