Our PolitiFact Georgia team looks at John Barge and charters: Not much of a flip.

Mary,

I also have simular concerns…

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Just keep in mind that my original $5 million guesstimate is based on an assumption of 750 FTE, we make monthly adjustments upward or downward to reflect actual numbers, and we only forecast future expenditures based on streams of income that are not grant-dependent, and I think that it makes more sense.

As far as corporations and nonprofits making grants to charter schools, this already happens in many cases. For that matter, they do the same for districts. The Gates Foundation is probably the most famous example and makes grants to all types of public schools. The Walton Family Foundation, based in Arkansas and connected to the Walmart founders, is an organization that makes grants to charter schools across the country. There are hundreds of companies that offer grants to schools.

Interestingly, though, gifts from individuals account for nearly three-quarters of the philanthropy in the U.S., as colleges and universities well know. I’d like to be able to attract enough positive attention to PAGA that wealthy individuals who support charter schools, dropout recovery & prevention, and education reform would consider adding us to their gift lists. That’s a long-term goal, though, and would probably require the employment of a full-time Development Director to manage its implementation. We’re not in that ballpark yet.

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Dr. Monica Henson, 10:17 am

“The Walton Family Foundation, based in Arkansas and connected to the Walmart founders, is an organization that makes grants to charter schools across the country. There are hundreds of companies that offer grants to schools.”
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Please read the excerpt below, from Sarah Knopp’s article, in the link I provide at the end of this post: (Ms. Knopp is a teacher in Los Angeles. The numbers which I leave within the excerpt refer to her well documented footnotes.)

“According to U.S. Census data, well over $800 billion is spent on education, public and private, at all levels in the United States each year.20 This makes it roughly the same size as the U.S. trade deficit with China. The private sector wants to get its hands on this money. . .

The Walton Family Foundation of Wal-Mart is the single biggest investor in charter schools in the United States, giving $50 million a year to support them.21 The Waltons specialize in giving money to opponents of public education. ‘Empowering parents to choose among competing schools,’ said John Walton, son of Wal-Mart’s founder, ‘will catalyze improvement across the entire K–12 education system.’22 According to a National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy (NCRP) report, ‘Some critics argue that it is the beginning of the ‘Wal-Martization’ of education, and a move to for-profit schooling, from which the family could potentially financially benefit. John Walton owned 240,000 shares of Tesseract Group Inc. (formerly known as Education Alternatives Inc.), which is a for-profit company that develops/manages charter and private schools as well as public schools.’23 Wal-Mart is a notorious union-busting firm, famous for keeping its health-care costs down by discouraging unhealthy people from working at its stores, paying extremely low wages with poor benefits, and violating child labor laws. The company has reportedly looted more than $1 billion in economic development subsidies from state and local governments.24 Its so-called philanthropy seems also to be geared to the looting of public treasuries.

As for a coordinated effort, the private incursion into public schools is being pushed by a band of jackals grouped around Bill Gates and the $2 billion that his Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have sunk into the education “reform” movement. The foundation funded a 2006 study by the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce called Tough Choices or Tough Times, ’signed by a bipartisan collection of prominent politicians, businesspeople, and urban school superintendents,’ which called for a series of measures including: (a) replacing public schools with what the report called “contract schools,” which would be charter schools writ large; (b) eliminating nearly all the powers of local school boards—their role would be to write and sign the authorizing agreements for the contract schools; (c) eliminating teacher pensions and slashing health benefits; and (d) forcing all 10th graders to take a high school exit examination based on 12th grade skills, and terminating the education of those who failed (i.e., throwing millions of students out into the streets as they turn 16).25

In the beginning, the Gateses used their dollars and employees to push school districts such as Los Angeles to break up mega-high schools into ’small learning communities.’ But now they are advising superintendents to give up that project and go straight for independent charters. Gates’ $60 million project, ‘Ed in ’08: Strong American Schools,’26 will use the elections this year to influence politicians to accept their three mandates: standardization of curriculum nationally, merit pay for teachers, and more time in schools. The campaign’s money comes from Bill Gates and Eli Broad, a Los Angeles real estate magnate. Roy Romer, the former superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, is its spokesman, and it counts among its supporters a diverse crowd—from Rod Paige, the former secretary of education, who once called teachers’ unions ‘terrorist organizations,’ to Janet Murguia, president and CEO of the corporate-backed National Council of La Raza. It trumpets success stories, like its ‘Mission Possible: Greensboro, North Carolina,’27 where 383 teachers were paid bonuses in direct relation to their students’ test scores.

The movement also has regional boosters. In Los Angeles, Eli Broad, the billionaire who tried to engineer the mayoral takeover of Los Angeles schools, gave Steve Barr and his nonprofit Green Dot $10 million. Last spring Green Dot took over the 2,600-student Locke High School from the Los Angeles Unified School District and has a goal of expanding to forty-one schools throughout Los Angeles.28 Green Dot is supported by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who invited Green Dot executive Marshall Tuck onto his five-person educational advisory board. Villaraigosa is currently pushing for a $7 billion bond measure for the November ballot in Los Angeles, $450 million of which would be earmarked for charter schools if his friend (and former school board member) Caprice Young has her way.29 It’s not surprising that Green Dot’s ties with Democratic Party politicians are so strong, since founder Steve Barr cut his political teeth campaigning for Gary Hart, Bruce Babbitt, and Michael Dukakis.30

Globally, companies are being coached about how to get their hands on state money allocated for public services. An important new book called The Global Assault on Teachers and Their Unions: Stories for Resistance chronicles an international movement to privatize education.31 ‘Education corporations’ are popping up in China on the ashes of public elementary schools. ‘City Academies’ in England are being handed over to private sponsors. Reports shared among these policy-makers offer strategies for how to accomplish this deregulation. One such report is ‘The Politics of Education Reform: Bolstering the Supply and Demand: Overcoming Institutional Blocks,’ published by the World Bank in 1999.32 (The institutional ‘blocks’ are, of course, teachers’ organizations.)

There is no monolithic bloc of evil government and corporate forces marching along a single road map to privatization. Some charter schools were created on the genuine initiative of community members or teachers and parents. In some schools, like ones based specifically on antiracist curriculum, students are undoubtedly learning in a better atmosphere than they were before. But in Los Angeles, for example, while these represent only a handful of the 147 charters, dominated by EMOs and CMOs, they are used to blunt criticism of the dominant, corporate trend in the charter school movement.”

http://www.isreview.org/issues/62/feat-charterschools.shtml

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And from the excerpt which I posted at 1:14 pm, please notice the following phrase, the full context of which is posted at the end of this post:

“c) eliminating teacher pensions and slashing health benefits. . .”

Now, please read the language of HB 664, sponsored last January by state Representatives Jan Jones and Edward Lindsey:
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“A BILL to be entitled an Act to amend Title 47 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating to retirement and pensions, so as to amend certain definitions; to provide that the Georgia Charter Schools Commission may elect to exclude all teachers in a commission charter school from membership in the Teachers Retirement System of Georgia; to provide that the Georgia Charter Schools Commission may make an irrevocable election to exclude public school employees from membership in the Public School Employees Retirement Fund; to provide for notice; to provide for a refund of employer and employee contributions; to provide conditions for an effective date and automatic repeal; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.”

Note these particular words from HB664, sponsored by Representatives Jan Jones and Edward Lindsey, in last year’s General Assembly:

“to provide that the Georgia Charter Schools Commission may elect to exclude all teachers in a commission charter school from membership in the Teachers Retirement System of Georgia. . .”

I hope, also, that Georgia’s public school teachers (and other state workers) as well as state teacher retirees (and state workers) read in Friday’s AJC (8/24/12) that their state health benefit plan premiums (through the state’s Department of Community Service) would be increasing by 9% to 30%, in the coming year.
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And, some are still not seeing the national and state agenda to “starve the beast of government” in favor of private market interests? The only ways to stop this stealthy out-of-balance private-market interests movement are:

(1) To be aware of what is happening, in truth, regardless of what some may “spin” as truth, and

(2) To vote out of office those politicians of that ideological persuasion who have the power to implement that agenda. (One, also, has to question: Could some of the politicians who are so fervently carrying out such an extreme ideological agenda also be benefitting, personally, by doing do? I do not know the answer to that question, but I must continue to think and to question because of the intensity of feelings which these issues are drawing.)
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Full context, from Sarah Knopp’s article, regarding the elimination of teachers’ pensions, follows:

“The foundation (The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) funded a 2006 study by the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce called Tough Choices or Tough Times, ’signed by a bipartisan collection of prominent politicians, businesspeople, and urban school superintendents,’ which called for a series of measures including: (a) replacing public schools with what the report called ‘contract schools,’ which would be charter schools writ large; (b) eliminating nearly all the powers of local school boards—their role would be to write and sign the authorizing agreements for the contract schools; (c) eliminating teacher pensions and slashing health benefits; and (d) forcing all 10th graders to take a high school exit examination based on 12th grade skills, and terminating the education of those who failed (i.e., throwing millions of students out into the streets as they turn 16).25″

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@ Dr. Monica Henson, 1:40 pm

“I don’t believe that any public educator has the authority to make the presumptuous statement that most families’ public education choice ought to be limited to the local public school district. It is not your job, Mary Elizabeth, or mine, to dictate to any family what is the best educational choice for their children and where they should put them in school.”
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Dr. Henson, I have never stated or implied that it was my “job” “to dictate to any family what is the best educational choice for their children and where they should put them in school.”

If some parents wish to send their children to private schools, for instance, then I believe that they should be able to do so. However, I also believe that these parents should spend their own money, and not my public tax money nor the tax money of other citizens, to do so.

I have stated, previously, that I also support public charter schools which are approved through the Boards of Education of their local school districts because those school districts are able to control and balance what is necessary, financially, to serve well ALL of the students in their districts – those in the ttraditional public schools and those in public charter schools. If a specific charter school is denied assigment by a local Board of Education, the parents of that charter school may appeal to the State’s Board of Education, through the Superintendent of Schools, by law, presently.

Moreover, I have demonstrated, through the links that I have provided on this blog, that some charter schools may have a more stealthy financial opportunism at work than meets the eye. I believe that local Boards of Education would be better able to focus on assessing what their particular charter schools may be about, in that financial regard, than those charter schools which are not monitored as closely. I support choice, but not choice in which my tax money – which is meant for the public education of all of the school children of Georgia – may be used for the profit purposes of “educational “opportunists, who may not have their students’ educational needs as their primary forcus and intent.

Why not work through your local school district, Dr. Henson, with your public charter school, to serve those students whose applications your school accepts? Could it be that Provost Academy’s dreams of expansion are not possible by doing that? If that is a reason for not working with local districts, to have them approve your charter schools, then the public needs to be aware of that fact, because there is only so much public tax money to go around for public schools in Georgia
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My next concern, #3, which I will post later, will involve the instructional cohesion which the State Board of Education, and local school districts in Georgia, working together, are able to bring to all of Georgia’s public school children.

Public charter schools that are authorized by local Boards of Education, of course, would be part of that overall cohesive delivery throughout Georgia. However, some charter schools – which are not working very specifically instructionally either with the State Board of Education, or with local Boards of Education – may not be a part of this overall instructional cohesion among districts throughout the state, in behalf of all of Georgia’s students. We live in a highly mobile society, and that can effect students’ academic development negatively, especially if students’ instructional records and instructional plans are not coordinated well among districts throughout Georgia.

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“I do not believe that the vast majority of students will learn best from an online approach to learning as opposed to having “flesh and blood” teachers in traditional public schools working with them directly, supplementing their overall instruction, perhaps, even with online services. Moreover, having served these students as an instructional leader, I have some concern that many, if not most, at-risk students may not function well with online instruction, although I support any educational means that will help these students to stay in school and to graduate from high school.”

Just because you don’t believe something doesn’t make it accurate. There are more than 2 million American students in K-12 school systems who take at least some of their instruction online. While not every student wants or needs a full-time virtual school, for many students, it’s a great choice. And it is their PARENTS who should be able to make that choice, not local public educators who favor the continuation of the monopoly on public education and keeping all education dollars in the hands of the local school district. The legislature of Georgia and many other states agree with my position.

PAGA students do have flesh-and-blood teachers interacting with them, even though the instructional delivery platform in online. Our teachers have the ability to run live-link learning sessions as needed for small groups and invidivuals. Moreover, these teachers are experienced educators who have all but one worked in person in public schools and proven themselves to be among the best educators not only in Georgia, but in other states as well. Our Magic Johnson Bridgescape students will be spending approximately 80% of their time onsite working on their computers, with the remaining time spent with their Advisors, and with Teachers if needed for tutoring and remediation.

I have also served as an instructional and administrative leader of at-risk students, including working as the chief instructional officer of a charter high school that provided a hybrid learning environment for a 100% Title I dropout population–chartered by Atlanta Public Schools and operated by a nonprofit corporation, not a private, for-profit education services provider–and I have seen firsthand that the combination of excellent teachers plus computer-based content delivery can be powerful.

As far as seeking approval of a local board of education in order to have chartered PAGA, it is neither realistic nor feasible to secure local approvals from 180 public school districts. PAGA was not intended or designed to be a single local public school, but a statewide charter LEA. If PAGA had been chartered by a local board of education, then it would have surrendered considerable autonomy and would have had to adhere to local BOE requirements and restrictions that may be in conflict with the mission and vision of the Board of Directors and the school’s leadership and staff.

“I believe that local Boards of Education would be better able to focus on assessing what their particular charter schools may be about, in that financial regard, than those charter schools which are not monitored as closely.”

Really? Like Fulton County Schools did with the Fulton Science Academy, a locally chartered school? Even in the face of their concerns over the charter school’s finances, the Fulton County BOE was willing to award them a three-year renewal instead of the requested ten-year renewal. That doesn’t sound like rigorous oversight to me. As far as financial oversight is concerned, the Charter Schools Division of the GaDOE provides far more stringent and rigorous oversight of state-chartered special schools than Fulton County Schools has provided for its locally chartered schools. The Charter Schools Division follows best practices promoted by the National Association of Charter School Authorizers. The idea that a state-chartered special school just somehow floats around with minimal oversight is ridiculous.

As far as your argument that I will reiterate (once again) that NOT A SINGLE DOLLAR in Georgia is being redirected away from any public school district in order to fund any of the state-chartered special schools. There is zero reduction in state funding of district schools in order to fund state-chartered special schools. I’m not sure what’s not sinking in on that point.

Our students all bring their GTID with them to PAGA and are assigned them by us if they come to us from out-of-state, private school, or homeschool. We participate fully in the statewide information system via the MyGADOE Portal. We request students’ transcripts from their sending districts. Like any other public school district, we maintain permanent record files on all of our students.

PAGA is designed to offer a different public education option for families via virtual learning. I’d like to see PAGA expand to every district in Georgia, and my staff and I have to prove to our families that we deserve their trust and respect. Your position that families should not have public school choices outside of the limited offerings in their school district of residence is clear evidence that you are a defender of the status quo, which has not earned the respect and trust of the families who are opting out. For whatever reason, they don’t want their children to be held hostage by their local public school district. They deserve the choice of where to send their children for public school. And now they have it. I will work as hard as I can to keep that choice in their hands. Does that keep me employed? Of course. Does it grow PAGA into a larger district? I certainly hope it will. Will that help EdisonLearning make more money in the long run? It sure will, as long as they continue to provide the quality of service that we currently receive in serving our students.

There is nothing underhanded, unethical, or illegal about PAGA’s mission, vision, and values, or EdisonLearning’s, for that matter. The goal is to provide a high-quality public education to our students. We know going in that we will attract a significant percentage of high-risk kids. That’s why we are offering the Magic Johnson Bridgescape learning center component. But we have no intention of limiting our offering strictly to at-risk students, because that is not the mission of the school system we have opened. Students who live in districts that don’t offer a variety of world languages are underserved. So are students who have medical conditions that restrict their ability to attend brick and mortar schools. So are students who have been bullied mercilessly with no intervention by the adults in their local district schools. So are teenage mothers who have been told by their local school principal not to come back to school after their babies are born.

You and others who would presume to restrict the use of any tax dollars to the district school monopoly and hold families without the means to afford private schooling hostage to their ZIP codes have already lost that battle conclusively in Georgia. Your efforts would be far better spent in improving your own backyards than in casting stones at the new house on the block. We are happy to invite our district neighbors into our house to learn about what we do and talk about the possibility of collaborations to benefit students. But we are not interested in submitting to the rules of their houses, as they have already been shown not to work for the folks who have chosen to live in ours now.

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Apologies for the typo, and here is the correction:

As far as your argument that “per pupil funds of which the taxpayers, such as myself, have paid for the education of all of Georgia’s students through traditional public education which is not using marketing approaches for its enrollment” are being co-opted by state-chartered special schools, I will reiterate (once again) that NOT A SINGLE DOLLAR in Georgia is being redirected away from any public school district in order to fund any of the state-chartered special schools. There is zero reduction in state funding of district schools in order to fund state-chartered special schools. I’m not sure what’s not sinking in on that point.

The ONLY reason why most local school districts don’t use marketing approaches for their enrollment is because they hold a monopoly on the public funds to educate their resident students. They also have local real estate agents that market for them, if they are high-quality districts. Even within large school districts, there are clear delineations and degrees of quality in the schools–just ask a prospective homebuyer that the local real estate agents say. If the district is large enough, like Gwinnett County Public Schools, the local BOE may be directing hundreds of thousands of YOUR tax dollars, if you live there, to the Chamber of Commerce to promote the school system and support the local BOE’s political agenda.

Once competition for those students is introduced into a district, it becomes incumbent on the school system to market itself effectively. The best marketing is viral and word-of-mouth, which doesn’t cost a dime. Great schools enjoy the benefit of both and need not fear competition.

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Dr. Henson, I will answer as succintly as I can several of your remarks, from your posts from 9:36 pm to10:49 pm last evening, because I mainly want to address, this morning, what will be my concern #3. That concern will cover why I believe that district school systems, working in harmony with their district charter schools, and with the state Board of Education, can offer Georgians the most cohesive educational plan for instructional delivery to all of Georgia’s students.
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(1) You stated several times the following thought: “I will reiterate (once again) that NOT A SINGLE DOLLAR in Georgia is being redirected away from any public school district in order to fund any of the state-chartered special schools.”

My response is that from a narrow, legally-correct position, you are technically correct, but there is a catch. The money for state-chartered special schools will not come, directly, out of the direct money distributed to local school districts from the state of Georgia’s per pupil funds meant for those specific school districts (because of citizens’ protest about this during the last legislative session and because of the concern of some House legislators). However, per pupil funds for state charter schools do come fom the state’s overall educational budget, and I will emphasize, again, that there is only so much money in the state’s educational budget to be had. If an overabundance of state charter schools were to be authorized by the state’s Commission for Charter Schools, Georgia’s overall educational budget will certainly be depleted if district level funding remains the same. There are more financial complexities and considerations involved than simply thinking in terms of “allowing per pupil funds to follow the students.” Authorizing many more state public charter schools, which will not be working through and with Georgia’s school districts, might eventually mean a tax increase for Georgia’s citizens, in order to maintain funding to the district schools, at the present level.

I have no problem with Provost schools (and Edison Learning, Inc.) generating expansion in Georgia for their schools, but I think that, if you do market to expand significantly your schools in Georgia, then your funding needs to come more from grants from corporations and private individuals, such as from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, rather than from tax monies meant for the public education of all of the students in Georgia because there is a limited amount of that money to be had to educate all of Georgia’s students.

I will repeat a line from the Sarah Knopp article which I linked at 1:14 pm yesterday:

“According to U.S. Census data, well over $800 billion is spent on education, public and private, at all levels in the United States each year.20 This makes it roughly the same size as the U.S. trade deficit with China. The private sector wants to get its hands on this money. . . ”

(2) You state: “Just because you don’t believe something doesn’t make it accurate. There are more than 2 million American students in K-12 school systems who take at least some of their instruction online. While not every student wants or needs a full-time virtual school, for many students, it’s a great choice.”

My response was not simply based on an uninformed belief, but from my 35 years of teaching experience. I posted the following, regarding this issue, yesterday, at 12:52 pm (Caps added today, for emphasis):

“Moreover, having served these students as an instructional leader, I have some concern that many, if not most, at-risk students may not function well with online instruction, although I support any educational means that will help these students to stay in school and to graduate from high school. I believe the Magic Johnson Bridgescape Centers, which will offer these at-risk students places where they can work with teachers directly, ‘in the flesh,’ will meet with more success than online instruction without this extra human present dimension. (Magic Johnson’s Bridgescape Centers, as you have stated, are working in conjuction with Provost Acadamies in Georgia.) I do recognize that some students, at-risk AND OTHERWISE, will prefer an online instructional model. I support those limited numbers of students, who work best with an online style and approach to learning, being able to access online instruction; however, I believe online instruction is now offered within traditional public schools, to some degree. The main benefit, imo, that Provost Academies could offer the students of Georgia (while also working with traditional public schools) would be to focus upon those students who may be in the process of dropping out of school, or who have already dropped out of school, but still wish to receive a high school diploma.”

(3) You state: “As far as seeking approval of a local board of education in order to have chartered PAGA, it is neither realistic nor feasible to secure local approvals from 180 public school districts. PAGA was not intended or designed to be a single local public school, but a statewide charter LEA. If PAGA had been chartered by a local board of education, then it would have surrendered considerable autonomy and would have had to adhere to local BOE requirements and restrictions that may be in conflict with the mission and vision of the Board of Directors and the school’s leadership and staff.”

My response is “follow the money.” I am sorry to be so cynical relative to the intent of state charter schools (not yours necessarily) but, as they expand, they will absorb more state money from Georgia’s overall educational funds. I think that a better plan would be for public charter schools to work with public school districts, while being assured of having as much autonomy as possible (guaranteed, perhaps, from Georgia’s DOE). In this way, your school would be able to coordinate directly your innovative efforts with local school districts in order to help raise the academic standing of ALL of Georgia’s students, not only and mainly in behalf the students, themselves, but also in order to raise Georgia’s standardized test scores (which will effect the amount of incoming industry to the state), and especially to lower Georgia’s current drop-out rate, which is 33% (and 40% among minority students). This would be a great combined effort of Georgia’s public charter schools, working closely with Georgia’s traditional public schools, for the same purposes – which are to help all of Georgia’s students progress and achieve to their potential and to make Georgia a first-rate state, in educational and economic quality, for all of its citizens.

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When Dr. Henson and I began this substantive debate regarding state Commission charter schools and traditional public schools (which include district charter schools), I mentioned that I wanted to address several concerns which I would number in sequential posts. Below is a recapping of those concerns, and the development of my third, and final, concern, which involves academic cohesion and coordination in Georgia’s schools..
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(1) My first concern compared the cost of funding individual, and relatively autonomous, public charter schools with the cost of serving a much greater number of students in public school districts. (See my post at 10:50 am, August 25th, on this thread.)

(2) My second concern involved the use of public tax dollars, which have been used for traditional public education of all of Georgia’s students, for corporate-based schools, public and otherwise. (See my post at 12:52 pm, August 26th, on this thread.)

(3) My third concern will cover why I believe that district school systems, working in harmony with district charter schools, and with the state Board of Education, can offer Georgians the most cohesive educational plan for instructional delivery to all of Georgia’s students. (See below.)

This third, and final, educational concern is addressed not only to readers of this blog, but especially to Georgia’s state senators and representatives. You are the politicians who will make laws which will effect educational delivery to Georgia’s students for decades to come. I am making this final concern addressed especially to you, and I am appealing to each of you to rise above the fallacious belief throughout our state (and nation) that somehow charter schools will be the “saviors” of education in America. I believe this is erroneous thinking although I do believe that charter schools have their proper place in enhancing educational delivery. However, I do not want to see Georgia’s educational delivery system become one of educational anarchy. Let me take a few minutes to explain. Thank you, in advance, for taking the time to read these remarks.

Public charter schools might have a broad and positive influence on a large number of Georgia’s students, especially if they were to operate in conjunction with local school districts. We live in a highly mobile society, and that can effect each student’s academic development adversely, if students’ continuous advancement is not closely monitored throughout their k – 12 educational careers, not simply for a given year. Students’ instructional records and instructional plans must be well-coordinated among districts throughout Georgia. State charter schools, even though they operate under the umbrella of the state’s Department of Education, function so autonomously that I question whether they would be able to foster that type of coordinated educational cohesion with other educational agencies over an extended period of time. I would urge educators and politicians not to become overly enamored of any one state charter school, even if that individual charter school might be performing excellently. That school may have a select body of students who are few in number. Moreover, many of the students in state charter schools – as well as students who receive educational delivery through other means, such through home schooling, private schools, online instruction, or through traditional public schools, or distric-level charter schools – will be transferring to other educational situations and facilities, over the course of their twelve or more years in schools. I ask you to consider this question: What single agency is going to coordinate each student’s standing, overall for twelve or more years – not only as to where each student is located, at every point in time, in order to receive his/her course work, but where he/she is functioning instructionally, with academic specificity, at every point in time – so that the student’s present teachers will be able to know and then address instsruction for that student in a targeted way? I believe that the state Board of Education does not have the means to effectively monitor the whereabouts and progress of every, single student in Georgia. I believe that autonomous public charter schools will be focusing on the results that they can accomplish for their given body of students, especially for each school year. Their focus will not be upon the coordination of their students’ results with other agencies of educational delivery in Georgia. Private schools, home schooling, and online instruction, likewise, will have a focus exclusive to their own particular populations, especially for a given year. Only public school districts will have the means of coordination of students’ records not only between schools within their own districts, but also with schools outside of their districts, because they have already had a history of doing so for decades. Their mechanism for the coordination of students’ progress and developmental history through records has already been established, and they already have prioritized it as a value to be shared between educational agencies in Georgia.

I have written often of how important it is for each student’s precise instructional level to be addressed, at every point in a student’s continuous progress from k – 12, for students to reach their maximum potential. Georgia can no longer afford to have students lost in transferring from one academic setting to another. They must be closely followed, both as to where they physically are, but also as to where they are functioning academically, at point in time, for twelve or more years. We have seen how students can get “lost” in the system through how difficult it has been to track the whereabouts of students who end up dropping out of school. But, this, too, must be accomplished. We know that 90% of students in Georgia who drop out of school will end up in prisons. See link, below, for that data:

http://www.ajc.com/news/truancy-a-lingering-problem-1489975.html

In this age of technology and computer advancement, students records and instructional standing on standardized tests can be quickly accessed through a computer data system. Teams of teachers working together in school districts can study these test results and plan for the continual advancement of their mutual students based on their students’ precise instructional levels. Teachers in district public charter schools could, also, work with these teachers in the traditional district schools when their students transfer from one setting to another. Cohesive analysis of students academic histories may even determine that certain students may need more than four years to graduate from high school – under a directed, specific plan-of-action for 5, or even 6 years, in high school for those students to become proficient in reading and math skills, as well as in all of the high school curricula. Their reading and math scores should be thoroughly known and documented in 9th grade (as well as before 9th grade) so that all high school teachers are aware of their scores, via computer access, and remediation should be an ongoing process that should occur, with precision, well in advance of their beginning college or technical school. This approach is consistent with learning theories. Please read the link that I will provide in my next post, entitled, “Mastery Learning,” which will demonstrate how the rate of achieving mastery of content must be adjusted to individual student’s instructional needs. Of course, this rate of learning cannot be adjusted if the student’s academic history is unknown.

We must have continuity in instruction in Georgia’s educational delivery model. I hope that Georgia will be able to stand well ahead of “the crowd” of those who are simply joining educational bandwagons that charter schools are the “saviors” of education. Charter schools have their proper place, and working with district school systems which educate the large masses of students in Georgia, public charter schools may help to improve traditional public education, which does need improving, especially for with those large numbers of students who are dropping out of school.

The key factor toward ensuring that Georgia produces a state-if-the-art educational delivery model is not to try to dismantle traditional public education, but to use the assets traditional public education already possesses, in coordination with Georgia’s state Board of Education, and in coordination with district charter schools, to make Georgia’s traditional education better and to keep educational delivery in Georgia moving into the 21st century – with cohesion and coordination – for the benefit of all of Georgia’s public school children.

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The article basically points education should be based on aptitude ie anti No Child Left Behind. Am I missing something? You should of sent this to kathy cox years ago……..

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John Konop,

John Konop, 3:27 pm

“The article basically points education should be based on aptitude ie anti No Child Left Behind. Am I missing something? You should of sent this to kathy cox years ago…….”
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Years ago, when a major metropolitan Atlanta school system mandated that all of its 8th grade students take an algebra class (not considering each students’ individual instructional level), I knew as an instructional leader of 25 years, that over half of those 8th students would end up failing that course (and they did). I spent many hours writing a detailed article which would have informed not only educational leaders in that county’s instructional department, but also members of the state’s DOE as they design grade level curriculum, and the general public. I submitted my educational article to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, but it was never published to my disappointment – not for myself but for all of those students who failed that course who were simply misplaced in it to start with.

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@ Maureen – I double dog dare you to post the above data in a blog topic by itself. That’s not the only district….there are many, many others.

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You are more than welcome, CS2! And thank you for chiming in. Mary Elizabeth, I am still waiting for your opinion of public school districts entering into licensing agreements & other corporate contracts, and how that differs from what we do at PAGA.

Now, on to addressing some points in M.E.’s last couple of posts.

**”I think that, if you do market to expand significantly your schools in Georgia, then your funding needs to come more from grants from corporations and private individuals, such as from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, rather than from tax monies meant for the public education of all of the students in Georgia because there is a limited amount of that money to be had to educate all of Georgia’s students.”

I will remind you, ma’am, that PAGA is a PUBLIC school. We are entitled under the law to public funding. Tax monies meant for the the public education of all the students in Georgia are not the property of the school district fiefdoms, and I borrow CS2’s word because it fits like a kid leather glove. The state has the responsibility and authority to educate children in Georgia–education has always been a state responsibility–and the state is executing the will of the people via the decision of the legislature to fund state-chartered special schools. That battle has been fought and won. The unspoken fear of anti-charter district personnel is that some charter schools may demonstrate, like Pataula Charter Academy is doing and PAGA plans to do, that it is entirely possible to educate children well without spending at the same levels that districts have been doing. When that is proven on a large scale, the funding game will change dramatically.

I am confused. You bemoan “corporate-based schools,” yet you say that charter schools should be funded with corporate support instead of tax dollars. There are literally thousands of districts that benefit from corporate grants. Should they be required to give up public tax dollars from the state because they are able to secure corporate funding? Your argument does not make sense to me, even though I’ve read through it several times.

**”State charter schools, even though they operate under the umbrella of the state’s Department of Education, function so autonomously that I question whether they would be able to foster that type of coordinated educational cohesion with other educational agencies over an extended period of time.”

This is simply ridiculous. State-chartered schools report directly to the Charter Schools Division of GaDOE. They are required to participate in all educational reporting, have the identical access to state data warehouses that districts have, and their administrators interact almost daily with personnel throughout GaDOE. They are public schools, like it or not, and are perfectly capable of participating in the network of information that operates all over Georgia. They are required to maintain the same kinds of recordkeeping systems that any public school district must maintain. They are audited in order to ensure that the records are being kept and kept accurately. I have gotten a lot less grief and stalling over transcript requests that I’ve sent to charter schools than I do from many districts. There’s far less red tape to navigate in communicating with our fellow charter schools than there is in the byzantine large districts of metro Atlanta.

**”Only public school districts will have the means of coordination of students’ records not only between schools within their own districts, but also with schools outside of their districts, because they have already had a history of doing so for decades. Their mechanism for the coordination of students’ progress and developmental history through records has already been established, and they already have prioritized it as a value to be shared between educational agencies in Georgia.”

I cannot read this statement without laughing out loud. Pure absurdity that speaks for itself. This brings to mind the the doddering high school department chair insisting, “These young punk new teachers can’t possibly teach those incredibly difficult AP classes. We veterans have our lesson plans laminated from 25 years ago. We’ll keep our chokehold on those AP classes until we retire.”

**”We have seen how students can get “lost” in the system through how difficult it has been to track the whereabouts of students who end up dropping out of school.”

This is precisely the indictment that many parents have made against large school districts in pulling their kids out and enrolling them in charter schools. You have substantiated the position that negates your own argument.

The idea that innovation in public education ought to be limited to school districts interacting with locally chartered schools that they completely control is the very definition of “inside the box” thinking. Let’s stifle innovation and restrict only to those institutions that fit inside the box that was built decades ago. This is short-sighted and protectionist in the extreme. Apply this logic to the postal system: We’ll allow the USPS to tinker with the concept of overnight delivery of mail, but only post offices operated by the USPS will be permitted to do the tinkering. These upstarts like FedEx and UPS will be barred from delivering any packages, because they might do a better job of it and attract customers that otherwise would be hostage to the USPS monopoly.

I have enjoyed the opportunity to answer questions about the finances of Provost Academy Georgia. The debate is beginning to become tedious, though, with the repetition of positions that are simple conspiracy theory, in my view. I wish you all the best, Mary Elizabeth, and I thank you for your years of service to public education.

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It’s too late to be a-bloggin’, clearly!

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@ Mary Elizabeth – are you truly suggesting that our school districts, many who have had failing students and abysmal graduation rates, can monitor better than the state, which now has a new longitudinal data system? We have some districts with over 30k students…

You did not respond regarding the abominable example I gave of Baker County. Should I provide another?

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Mary Elizabeth, I am not trying to insult you. I am simply exasperated with your insistent repetition of arguments that are irrational.

District public schools, charter public schools, private schools, colleges & universities, and nonprofit organizations ALL operate under a “business” model, or they bankrupt themselves. You still haven’t addressed the fact that thousands of public school districts receive “corporate-based” funds, that they employ similar promotional strategies in student fund-raising, and that they sign licensing agreements with corporations, especially with regard to interscholastic sports. It’s as though you just refuse to see the paradoxical nature of your criticisms.

We have already begun an outreach program to school systems across the state, so your accusation that I don’t want to work with traditional public school districts is, quite simply, nonsense. At one of our summer community outreach meetings, a district sent a representative to ask why we are not going to put a Magic Johnson Bridgescape center in their city, because they would like for us to do so and work with them to identify students who would benefit–we have now moved that city into Year One of our strategic expansion plan rather than waiting until Year Two. Another district, a small rural one, contacted us to see if they could transfer their very small number of homebound students to PAGA because it would be less expensive for them to forego the FTE dollars those students would generate than it would be for them to hire a homebound teacher and pay that person’s full-time salary and benefits.

As for communication among educators regarding their students, our Teachers and Advisors are in constant contact with each other. Every single student we enroll, regardless of whether they are special needs, alternative education, at-risk, or honors/advanced, has a Learning Team composed of the Advisor plus the Teachers assigned to him/her. Teachers collaborate to create multi-disciplinary assignments for students. The idea that our delivery model is nothing more than a “dry exchange of records” is utterly inaccurate.

I honestly do respect your sincerity and admire your many years of service to educating kids. As I posted previously, I read many of the same publications you reference on a frequent basis. I’ve also been in this “business” of public education for quite a long time. I have several years’ experience managing the finances of public charter schools, not just the academic programs. I am sharing all of this information about PAGA’s finances (1) because it’s public record and if a citizen asks for it, I’m happy to provide it, and (2) because I think it clarifies reality for the readers of this blog. I fundamentally disagree with your premise, but I don’t mean for my disagreement to reflect a lack of respect for you as a person and as an educator.

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Charter Starter, Too, 6:30 am

As I have stated already, the DOE does monitor Georgia’s students – but from a distance and only with paperwork – and not with a first hand knowledge of specific students within a particular district. That is as it should be. The DOE is charged with monitoring the full 1,667,685 students in Georgia’s public schools. Again, that is well over 1 and 1/2 million students. Even a large metro school system, such as the DeKalb County School System, has only 102,000 students in comparison to the states 1,667,685 students. DCSS’s students in total are only 6% of the total students in Georgia of over 1 and 1/2 million students, which the DOE is charged with monitoring. Moreover, the DCSS has 83 elementary schools, 20 middle schools and 22 high schools, or a total of 125 schools. On the average that would mean, 816 students per school. (I realize that some high schools have more students, and that some middle and elementary students have less students than 816; however 816 is the average number of students, and that is the number with which I will work with to make my illustrated point.)

I certainly think that teachers, in a given school’s population of 816 students, can know those students personally and can share human ancedotes about those students with the receiving school’s teachers. They will also be bringing over all students’ records to the receiving school’s counselors when they visit in the receiving school. Teachers of these students, in district schools, are able to share information about students of more detail than simply will appear in cold records. They will share the records, but they will also be able to discuss students’ varied styles of learning, personality needs, etc. (When I had functioned as an Instructional Lead Teacher, I had monitored all the students in our elementary/middle school, and that total school population was over 700 students, at times. Part of my job function was to have discussed plans for specific students with their teachers, in terms of the best instructional group to assign specific students in point of time within the multiaged unit of 150 students. I also suggested additional instructional materials (outside of the normal curriculum material) to teachers for students who needed enrichment work, as well as for those students who needed remediation. That is the type of quality sharing and communication that I am referring to when I mention records.)

This type of humane coordination is not expected to be forthcoming from the DOE to all one and a half million students in Georgia. Student data is expected to be forthcoming from Georgia’s DOE. At the present time, there are relatively few state charter schools in operation, but if this movement increases through the re-creation of the state Commission of Charter Schools by the passing of the Constitutional Amendment in November, then many newly created state charters would report directly to the state’s DOE, not to a specific district school system. Again, the DOE does not generally know students firsthand, the way that teachers do – who communicate and share data among one another regarding students’ progress – in district level public schools.
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Now, to address your concern that I did not compare “apples to apples” but “oranges to apples” in analyzing the percentage of Cobb County’s School System’s overall operating budget that was used in hiring the for-profit managing company, Ombudsman, in 2011. I did call the CCSS this morning. (I could not call them over the weekend when I posted my original results.) In talking directly with Cobb County School System’s Budget Director, I learned that the operating budget for the CCSS for 2011 was $819, 376,569. When one takes the cost to the CCSS of hiring the for-profit services of Ombudsmand in 2011 for the amount of $2,555,587.50, one finds that the percentage of the overall budget used was .3%. That is exactly the same amount gathered when I had analyzed using the only operating budget available to me over the weekend, which was the operating budget for 2013. In other words, the amount is still the same of .3% – even when one compares “apples to apples.”

This was no surprise to me because I do have some understanding of mathematics, even though I functioned as an English/Reading teacher. However, what did surprise me was the duplicitous way in which you had parsed my words from my post, in which I had acknowledged – fully – to the reading public that I was going to use the figures for 2013 for the overall budget (because they were the only figures available to me over the weekend) with the 2011 cost of Ombudsman to the CCSS in order to give some rudimentary figures for thought.

Again, that the percentage results were exactly the same ( .3% ) using either the 2011 overall budget or the 2013 budget came as no suprise to me. As long as I gave full disclosure – which I did – there was nothing unethical about my weekend comparison. What was unethical, in my opinion, was your post which made it appear that I did not make full disclosure of the “apples to oranges” comparison, because you did not post my full remarks, and you had deleted that part of my post in which I had given full disclosure to the reading public. That was wrong for you to have done, imo.
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About your inquiry of me regarding both the Pautaula Charter Academy and the Baker County Academy, your question to me was this: “I ask you, does this look like a good return on your investment?”

My answer is “No,” it does not appear to be a good return on the investment. Everything is relative. I had previously compared Dr. Henson’s Provost Academy’s expense for the 269 students in her school, with an estimated 5 million dollar annual operating budget, to the DeKalb County School System total operating budget of $774.60 million dollars for 102,000 students, and I had found that the cost of serving her students would be approximately 2 and 1/2 times greater (actually 2.4 times greater) if all 102,000 students were served with the same small charter-like format which Dr. Henson’s school uses to serve their students.

That compares to your figures for Baker County Charter School, which (as I understand) would be an operating budget of $4,804,584.40,( i.e., 332 students X $14,471,64. per pupil funds received = $4,804,584.40 annual operating budget). It is interesting that (with the exact same enrollment of 332 students) the overall operating budget – for those enrollment numbers – of Baker County Charter School is just under 5 million dollars, similar to Dr. Henson’s school’s estimated budget of 5 million dollars for the year. Baker’s Charter is just under 5 million dollars for 332 students and Dr. Henson’s estimated budget was approximately 5 million, and her enrollment is presently also 332. However, the difference is that Dr. Henson has stated that Provost Academy would be receiving $6,400. in per pupil money (up from $4,440. per pupil money if the Magic Johnson Centers are made operative in conjuction with Provost Schools). Yet, Baker Charter Schools receives a full $14,471.64 in per pupil money to account for an almost 5 million dollar annual budget. Dr. Henson’s school would receive $6,400. in per pupil money. Why, one wonders, is her school projected for a 5 million dollar budget with only a maximum of $6400. per pupil money received? Doing the equivalent math – which I just did for Baker County Schools – that would come to an annual budget of $2,124,800.,( i.e. $6,400. per pupil money X 332 students for her school = $2,124,800.) I must say, I do not understand from what you are sharing here, why Dr. Henson would need an estimated 5 million dollar budget to serve her 332 students in Provost Academy. Of course, she has not yet disclosed the exact amount that her school will be paying Edison Learning, Inc. to manage Provost Academy’s schools, and there may be other factors of which I and the public are not yet aware. Moreover, I believe Dr. Henson had mentioned that she is expecting her school’s enrollment to increase to 750 students, but that has not happened yet.

All of these charter schools serve a relatively very small population of around 300 students and the results achieved on their standardized tests would need to be compared with their standardized test scores BEFORE they entered these charter schools. For instance, Pautaula Charter School had reading and math scores at the 90.5 %ile level. However, if last year, the scores of these students, individually, and as a composite, was at 92.5%, then it would appear that Pautaula did not perform as well as could be expected, but if their students scored 88.5% last year, then one assumes that Pautaula served well her population of students. Just as one must compare % of cost relative to hiring a for-profit company with the school’s (or school system’s) overall operating budget to analyze with validity, so one must also compare what students scored on standardized tests in a given charter school for the year, with the results of previous year’s scores, for that same body of students, to have a valid assessment. (One also needs to consider students’ potential, or IQ scores, but that is another topic for another day.)

I continue to maintain, if Georgia’s politicians attempt to dismantle (over time) Georgia’s public school districts and try to create, in their stead. an overabundance of these very small charter schools, then records in Georgia’s schools will be harder to keep cohesive, not only in analyzing financial undertakings, but also in analyzing academic achievement results. We must not dismantle our traditional public schools, we must help to improve them, by encouraging charter schools to work in collaboration with our traditional public schools, for the benefit of both. Otherwise, we will have a state of many disjoined small charter schools, without a refined, cohesive means to have full accountabilty, with depth and full validity, for what each is doing – both financially and instructionally.

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@ Mary Elizabeth – so you are suggesting that larger district offices like DeKalb and Gwinnett oversee students on a more….personal….level. I think they are probably very aware of individual students, say a SPED student, whose parent may be about to sue, or parents calling county office to address issues that their principals haven’t addressed. But if you are saying these districts have greater oversight ability for 30,000 or more kids and a way to look at these kids individually, I would say that’s not only improbably, but impossible.

You are right that the DOE as a whole institution cannot oversee every child in Georgia – it only oversees larger institutions, like districts, and like it would with the Commission. Which is why we need a Commission that can oversee more personally, like a district office might, their individual charter schools. Thank you for reinforcing the need for this office. I agree wholeheartedly.

Best regards for improved health with a rest for you over the next few days.

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@Dr. Henson, 9:15 pm, August 28, 2012

My analysis was based upon the below remarks which you had posted when I requested to know how many students you served and what your annual operating budget would be:

On August 23, 2012, at 9:22 pm, on this thread, you had stated this response to my inquiry:
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“Mary Elizabeth, everything you ask for is public record because we are a public school. Our enrollment as of today is at 269 students. We have a goal of 750 students for School Year 2013 and will accept students all year-round. If we have more then 750 enrollees, then we will happily accept them.

We currently employ nine Georgia-certified teachers and five degreed advisors, all of whom have either teaching or counseling certificates, some also with social work licensure, and several with graduation coach experience. We also employ three administrators, including me, a community outreach manager, an administrative assistant, and a data owner (more commonly known as a registrar).

Our state funding is approximately $4,440 per pupil. We won an Implementation Grant in the amount of $600,000 from the State Board of Education. This grant is part of a federal block grant for charter schools from the U.S. Department of Education. As a public school, we are eligible to draw Title I, Title IIA, IDEA (special education funding), and funding for alternative education for students who present at high risk. We are in the process of finalizing the specifics, but I anticipate our operating budget to be in the neighborhood of $5 million for this first year of school.”
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Based on those remarks, I believed that your budget (which you had additionally stated needed to be finalized by the end of the week) was for your present enrollment of 269 students. I had assumed that your budget would increase, if your enrollment actually climbed to 750 students.

I will certainly, now, correct my assessment that the DeKalb School System would need a budget 2.4 times its present budget to serve 269 students in 380 charter-like schools, similar to yours. Since your estimated annual budget of 5 million dollars is based on an enrollment of 750 students (rather than of 269 students), then the DCSS would need only 136, not 380, charter-like schools (similar to Provost’s) to serve its 102,000 students. That would mean that it would cost the DeKalb School System less money, not 2.4 times more money, to serve all of its 102,000 students in charter-like schools, similar to those of Provost Charter Schools.

One financial element, however, remains nebulous, imo, and that is whether or not the Magic Johnson Bridgescape Centers would be receiving additional educational tax money.

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Students who attend the Magic Johnson Bridgescape centers would allow the school to draw down brick-and-mortar funding, which will be $7,409 per pupil. Virtual students working from home allow us to draw down $4,706 funding per pupil. I anticipate that the majority of kids enrolled at the MJB centers will also be classified as alternative education, which is weighted higher than regular education for per-pupil funding purposes. I have no way of predicting how many of those kids will be special education and/or limited English proficient, which allows to draw down federal funding for educating them.

I still would like a response from you on the issue of district public schools receiving corporate grant funding, using corporate promotions for fundraising & sports sponsorship, and doing business with corporations via licensing agreements on software, purchases of textbooks, technology, custodial supplies, and other items used in the operation of schools. Also, many public schools have created their own nonprofit foundations that accept donations of money from businesses, other nonprofits and private citizens–should they be required to give up the amount of public funding equivalent to the funds they raise in these foundations?

Are you also willing to acknowledge that there is no such thing as a dichotomy between a business model and an educational model for operating schools? In other words, a nonprofit entity must operate in such a fashion as to break even financially, and some nonprofits market their services in a manner that brings in surplus funds, such as CISGA marketing its Performance Learning Center model and then holding periodic training events for the staff of PLCs to pay district public school funds to come to Atlanta and be trained by CISGA staff. I am curious to see how you make this distinction in your own mind.

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@ ME – You raise some good points above. There are 2 things to consider:

1. The management fees to corporations generally include the costs for management positions (salary and benefits) that would typically be at central office handling things like payroll, finance, reporting, etc. Secondly, depending on the contract’s structure, sometimes all salaries for running the school are include, so it makes it appear that the management company has a higher percentage. I hope that makes sense.

For a one to one comparison, you would really have to pull out the central administration and all of the instructional positions and expenses generally covered at a county office and put those up against the management company’s piece of the charter budget. I can’t really qualify this without having a district budget and a charter budget and management contract, so I will refrain from making any statements further, but I did want to give some context.

2. I mentioned before that if you are going to compare Ombudsman to say, a Provost, you can’t divide Omsbudsman by the whole district budget. Ombudsman pretty much stands alone like a school and serves a very specific population of students. In some school districts, Ombudsman is being paid for their fee (which includes staff and related instructional costs), but sometimes there is also facility funds allotted. This is a very similar structure as a management company for a charter. I have run the numbers in a school district – all you need to find out is enrollment. Then you can see what the per pupil amount going to these students is compared to the district average. I encourage you to run the numbers. I think you will see that the per pupil amount allotted is higher than the district average and significantly higher than the charters’ per pupil average in the district. I don’t necessarily take issue with that fact, as it is a specialized population that the districts’ have determine Ombudsman can serve. I just wish others would respect the same type of decision making with the charters – particularly given that the charters have a finite amount of funding to utilize and the districts have a large pot to allocate in various ways, particularly given the recent dissolution of the 65% rule.

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Interesting that you don’t feel qualified to comment on public school activity with corporate support because of your instructional background as opposed to school finance, yet you feel qualified to analyze an annual operating budget.

PAGA pays EdisonLearning, Inc., $250,000 annually (regardless of our enrollment numbers) as a fee for professional services. They do not “manage” our school–that is my job, along with my two fellow administrators. We have a five-year contract with EL during which time our annual fee for services will stay level. If we meet our FTE goal of 750 students and a $5 million annual budget, then our fee will constitute 5% of our total operating budget (less if we exceed our enrollment target, more if we don’t meet it) in FY 2013.

5% may sound like a lot compared to what DCSS spends on its contract with Ombudsman. However, it’s deceptive to view a single cost in a vacuum.

For example, we do not spend a single dollar on textbooks, which can range anywhere from $25 to more than $150 annually per pupil in the U.S. in a brick and mortar school. High school textbook costs are far more than an elementary school’s, for obvious reasons. Let’s say for purposes of illustration that a brick and mortar public school district in Georgia spends an average of $88 ($25 + $250 divided by 2, to get a reasonable estimate of an average textbook expenditure) per student on textbooks and serves 750 FTE high schoolers, and $5 million is the high school’s annual operating budget. That expense amounts to $66,000 annually, or 1.32% of the operating budget. PAGA spends $0 on this line item.

A better point of comparison is in salaries & benefits, and it is here where the advantage of an education services contract becomes apparent, as well as the ability to leverage technology to individualize instruction and remove “class size” from the equation. So let’s compare PAGA to an example small high district school.

Our example high school probably would have an experienced principal (estimated $85K salary) and an assistant principal (estimated $60K salary). The district’s central office employs a superintendent (estimated $100K salary), probably an assistant superintendent of finance (estimated $75K salary), a director of curriculum and instruction (estimated $75K salary), a director of special education (estimated $60K salary), and a personnel director (estimated $70K salary) to service the schools.

Let’s assume it’s a small district with three schools, an elementary, middle, and high school. For simplicity’s sake, let’s divide the central office administrator salaries by three and add those to the two building administrators’ salaries. So we have $145K in building admin, and $380K in central office admin divided by 3, or $127K. $145K + $127K totals $272K in administrative salaries alone. Let’s assume that benefits run about 25% of salary. So our mythical high school is funding in the neighborhood of $340K in administrative salaries & benefits, or 6.8% of its annual $5 million operating budget, of which $158750 is admin salaries & benefits ($127K for salaries plus 25% of $127K for benefits).

This high school that has 750 students, if it observes class sizes of 30 kids, employs at least two dozen teachers, each at an average annual salary of, let’s say, $50,000. That’s a teacher payroll of $1.2 million without benefits, which would add an extra $300K. So we’re spending $1.5 million on instructors in this mythical high school. We won’t add in guidance counselors, graduation coaches, custodians, cafeteria employees, or administrative support staff, to keep things simple.

EXAMPLE DISTRICT HIGH SCHOOL
Administrative salaries & benefits: $340K for 2 building administrators & 1/3 of 5 central office administrators
Instructor’s salaries: $1.5 million for 24 teachers
Textbooks: $66K for 750 FTE students
Education Services Fee: $0

TOTAL: $1,906,000 = 38% of $5 million annual operating budget

PROVOST ACADEMY GA
Administrative salaries & benefits: $270K for 3 administrators
Teachers salaries & benefits: $730K for 13 teachers
Textbooks: $0
Education Services Fee: $250K

TOTAL: $1,250,000 = 25% of $5 million annual budget

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Charter Starter, Too, 11:18 am

@ Mary Elizabeth – Thank you for reassessing your numbers. It is much appreciated.
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And, thank you for your words to me, above, CS2. I wish to apologize to Dr. Henson, and to the readers of this blog, for my unintentional error.

I will have a few brief, closing comments tomorrow regarding the charter movement, in general, in Georgia. I hope that all will have a good evening.

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You know, it just struck me (sigh, days late) one of the things that Dr. Barge said in his survey:

He agreed with this statement: “I support allowing the local boards of education, the state board of education and the Georgia Charter School Commission to approve and monitor charter schools.”

His comments said this (emphasis added): “However, I find it greatly disappointing that we NEED another administrative body to do something that the local, and ultimately, the state Board of Education, SHOULD be able to do.”

The man DID flip (and no, Catlady, it wasn’t just a hop – it was a full bodied FLIP). At the time he was running, he recognized that we DO need another body because the current authorizing structure is not doing what they should be able to do.

It remains interesting to me that Dr. Barge published a whole lot of data that is absolutely refutable, as it is contrary to what the DOE has published on its own website (funny, funny that the Report Card and demographic reports always available before on the website are not working right now….)

The information he provided goes contrary to actual data on authorization of start up charters. He and others like to plump up the charter numbers by adding in district charters like conversions, LEA start ups, and system charters). He likes to say we have over 200 charters. In actuality, we have about 60 independent charters that meet the federal definition of a charter school. He cleverly failed to provide the start up charter authorization trends and the abysmally low approvals over the last 10 years of independent schools.

He failed to publish academic data in the same manner that district schools are published – the AJC itself publishes grade levels and subject area meets and exceeds rates, but Dr. Barge didn’t bother to show THAT. He showed only AYP rates which are being phased out an no longer used. He didn’t even bother to mention that 11% of our Title I schools show up on the alerts, priority, and focus lists now used for accountability and only 3% of charter Title I schools are on the lists.

He failed to show the financial data that his department published that demonstrates our charters are NOT financially in the hole, as they have a small surplus. The are staying afloat despite last year earning under $5000 per pupil on average.

He failed to report the successful audits of these schools.

He failed to report the enrollment, wait lists, and demographic information of these schools.

Dr. Barge failed this state by flipping his stance (and denying doing so) and purposefully masking and positioning data to suit his political stance.

He, and the other Superintendents and boards, are pushing a political agenda using state resources including the use of department personnel, technology, and other resources, which is patently unethical and, by some legal experts’ opinion, illegal.

He represented his opinion as the opinion of the Department and the State Board of Education and still, to this date, has not put in writing that his opinion is his own and that others in the Department and on the State Board, as one board member put it “vigorously disagrees.”

Dr. Barge is representing his buddies in the Establishment. He is not representing kids. The district superintendents and boards are protecting the bureaucratic structures they have erected. They are not representing the needs of teachers or kids. If he or they represented kids and the public that voted them in, they would wait the public vote on the issue rather than trying to influence the vote.

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