Last Thursday, the DC Public Charter School Board voted six to zero to proceed with the revocation of Excel Academy PCS’s charter at then end of the 2017 to 2018 term.  As background, the board decided at its November 21, 2017 meeting to begin the revocation process and, on December 21st of last year, it held a public hearing on the matter.  At that time I predicted that the proposed turnaround plan offered by the school was most likely too little too late.  It turns out that the members of the PCSB sided with this assessment.

Chair Dr. Darren Woodruff summarized the position of many board members in the statement that he read that afternoon:

“As a board member, I continue to be supportive of the Excel mission – providing a high-quality education in one of the most challenged areas of our city through a school that serves more than 600 almost exclusively African American, economically disadvantaged elementary and middle school girls and their families. With one of the most important student populations we have and as the father of a daughter who attended DC public charter schools I am very aware of how important it is for us – this board, our public charter schools, and the larger community – to get the education of our girls right. We will not get a second chance to do well by these students. Toward that goal I want to acknowledge the obvious passion, engagement and commitment I witnessed during our December hearing with Excel faculty and staff, board members, parents, and students. I have no doubt that everyone involved wants nothing but positive outcomes for these girls.

“Every five years the Public Charter School Board is tasked with reviewing the performance of our schools to determine if they have met the goal of providing a high-quality education. And in the case of Excel, despite the clear commitment and engagement we have witnessed, the student outcomes have unfortunately not matched the passion. The agreed upon expectation of earning an average of at least 45 percentage points on the performance management framework over the past five years was not achieved. A PMF score above 45 was only achieved once in the last 5 years, and that was during the 2012-2013 school year. In fact, the most recent score from last year was 37 points out of 100, the school’s lowest score over the 5-year period we are addressing. In addition, student proficiency at Excel in both reading and math on the PARCC was lower than the citywide average for the past 2 years when compared to girls attending other schools. So, the trend for student performance over the past several years has been negative, despite any benefits that may have occurred from learning in an all-girl setting.

“Recent changes to the school’s academic leadership team, a reconstituted Board of Trustees, the planned addition of a Chief Academic Officer, implementation of restorative justice practices, and a proposed school turnaround plan all represent welcome steps that ideally would have been implemented when the first indications of decreased student performance became evident. However, without these steps more fully in place and clear data on their impact, this Board lacks convincing evidence that Excel represents the best opportunity for these young girls that we all care so much about. For this reason, I am in support of the staff recommendation for charter revocation.”

Attorney Stephen Marcus, representing Excel, made the same argument last week as he did at the public hearing in November: that the school’s relatively low score on the Performance Management Framework was due to the relatively greater percentage of children living in poverty that are enrolled.  However, PCSB deputy director Naomi Rubin DeVeaux forcefully refuted this testimony, asserting that there are 22 D.C. charters that currently teach a greater proportion of these children, and that 17 of these schools score higher on the PMF.  She stated that the correlation between economic status and academic preparedness is well known and is a challenge that charter schools accept as their “central task” of closing the achievement gap.

In the end, the message from the board was clear and unequivocal to the charters that it oversees;  don’t wait until you get in trouble to seek help, and if you are going to operate in the nation’s capital, you will meet your academic goals.

I’m sitting here Wednesday evening listening to the public hearing considering the charter revocation of Excel Academy Public Charter School.  The session is perfectly identical to so many I have seen in the past.  There is an overflow crowd of the school’s parents.  The DC Public Charter School Board is presenting its data demonstrating the reasons the charter should be closed.  The school will then provide testimony promising to revamp its board, change its leadership, and improve its prodigy.  Later, mothers and fathers of enrolled scholars will offer emotionally moving stories about the positive experience attending this school has made toward their children’s growth and development.

It is probably all too late at this point.  The charter has been warned about its academic performance for years.  The bottom line is that we never should have reached this predicament.

Excel PCS, like several of the schools before the board this week, has contracted with the Ten Square Consulting Group, is about to engage with Charter Board Partners, and has hired Stephen Marcus as its attorney.  So please allow me to make a simple suggestion for all of D.C.’s charters.

When considering opening a charter school go through FOCUS’s program that is designed to make this goal a reality.  Please hire Ten Square right from the start to evaluate your program.  Utilize Charter Board Partners to populate the board with members.  Finally engage with Building Hope to secure a permanent facility.  In fact, the DC PCSB should be relied upon as a resource.  We are so extremely fortunate in this town to have so many truly outstanding charter school support organizations.

If you follow my advice good things will happen.  Financial support and other valuable resources may come from groups such as Fight for Children, CityBridge Education, and Education Forward.  Don’t wait unit you get in trouble.  Being proactive may preserve all of the heroic hard work that the school exerted to have their charter accepted by the charter board in the first place.

On this particular night I’m impressed with the testimony of Stephen Marcus.  He successfully introduced an interruption in the steady momentum toward charter revocation when he asked the question of where these students would go if the school was closed.  There is no other all girls school like Excel in the nation’s capital.  Many of the Ward 8 educational institutions located near this facility, both charter and DCPS, score lower on the PARCC standardized test than this one.

The board will vote in January regarding the fate of Excel.  Whatever happens, whether the school’s doors are shuttered at the end of June or if it is allowed to continue operating under a long list of conditions, is almost beside the point.  Sadly, all of this considerable time and energy could and should have been avoided.

There was a clear unambiguous message that was delivered to D.C.’s charter sector at last night’s monthly meeting of the DC Public Charter School Board:  if you want to keep operating your school, then you will meet your charter’s goals.

The actions throughout the long night were perfectly consistent, exceedingly painful, and correct.  It was as if the board has reached the same collective conclusion about the history of public education in the nation’s capital that I have been repeating on this page.  Namely, it is the belief that we have failed our kids for way too long and if a school is providing a program that is not resulting in academic excellence the doors will be shuttered.

So let’s go down the list.  Somerset PCS was up for its five year review.  The board has determined that it is not meeting “its goals and academic expectations.”  As part of its charter agreement the school will now have to meet specific Performance Management Framework metrics for the next three years or it will be closed.

Cesar Chavez PCS faced its 20 year review.  Again, it has not meet “its goals and student achievement expectations.”  Therefore, the Parkside Middle School, the lowest performing campus in the LEA’s portfolio, will begin to be shutdown immediately, one grade at a time beginning with the sixth prior to the start of the next school year.  The Capitol Hill and Chavez Prep campuses’ operations will also be halted if they do not reach specific PMF levels over the next three years.

Also up for its 20 year review was Seed PCS.  Continuing the pattern, the board found that it has not met “its goals and academic expectations.”  The result is that its middle school will also wind down by the end of the 2019-to-2020 school year.  It will, however, have the option of applying to re-open its middle school in the 2021-to-2022 term.

Protests by some school representatives against these moves due to the presence of a high proportion of at-risk children, the fact that they were in turnaround situations, or that the PMF floor was increasing next year, were met with a distinct lack of interest by the PCSB members.  Executive director Scott Pearson pointed out that if a school had not met its targets, then the entire charter could be revoked, not just the campuses that were closed in the instances above.

Tomorrow night the board is considering the revocation of Excel PCS’s charter, which does not bode well for this institution.

It was actually easy to tell right from the start of this session that it was not going to be a good evening.  Achievement Prep PCS was up early in the agenda for a charter amendment.  The school has had an interesting reaction to the poor academic performance of its elementary school.  It wants to decrease the enrollment of its second and third grades so that each do not have more than 60 pupils.   The school believes that this will improve the culture and instruction of its students.  There are now 80 kids enrolled in the second grade and 93 children in the third grade.  Achievement Prep would hold an internal lottery through My Schools DC for these spaces for those currently in the first and second grades.  Unfortunately, for this portion of the meeting much of the sound was unavailable through the live feed, but the discussion was obviously tense.  It ended with the school’s founder and CEO Shantelle Wright accusing the board of “an abuse of power” and “the overreach of this board and this staff in particular.”  She was reacting to being told that the  PMF targets she agreed to at the November meeting in return for allowing her school to continue to be in business would have to be voted on by the PCSB in January.

There were a few positives.  D.C. Prep PCS, Eagle Academy PCS, and Center City PCS all sailed through their charter reviews, the first two schools at 15 years and the third at 10 years.  In addition, Lauren Catalano, the principal of Somerset PCS, did an amazingly admirable job making the case that conditions should not be placed on her school even if it was a lost cause.  In the end yesterday was an extremely tough session.

Yesterday, the DC Public Charter School Board released the results of the 2016 to 2017 school quality reports, which demonstrate school rankings on the organization’s Performance Management Framework.  The overall takeaway from this measure is that more students than ever, 47.4 percent of all pupils attending charters, are enrolled in Tier 1 schools, which are those obtaining the highest scores.  This is an extremely positive trend.

Let’s focus on some of the schools doing some great academic work.  Among those recording the greatest scores are:

1. BASIS DC PCS (High School) – 95.5%
2. Washington Latin PCS – Upper School – 89.1%
3. Latin American Montessori Bilingual PCS – 87.7%
4. KIPP DC – Connect Academy PCS – 87.4%
5. Cedar Tree Academy PCS – 86.8%

Here are the top five charters with the highest results who are educating a student body composed of at least 60 percent of children living in poverty:

1. Friendship PCS – Blow Pierce Elementary School – 79.0%
2. Early Childhood Academy PCS – 69.9%
3. Cedar Tree Academy PCS – 86.8%
4. Friendship PCS – Blow Pierce Middle School – 65.9%
5. SEED of Washington DC (High School) – 66.1%

Finally, listed below are those charters that have been categorized at Tier 1 from the time the PMF was introduced in 2012:

1. Washington Latin PCS – Upper School
2. Latin American Montessori Bilingual PCS
3. DC Prep PCS – Edgewood Middle School
4. Two Rivers PCS – 4th Street
5. Thurgood Marshall Academy PCS
6. KIPP DC – College Preparatory Academy PCS

A few takeaways for me.  I’m extremely impressed with the number of Friendship PCS campuses, five, on the Tier 1 list.  My friends Susan Schaeffler and Allison Fansler are doing a great job at KIPP DC PCS with 11 campuses graded as Tier 1.  DC Bilingual PCS is there; I just recently interviewed its head of school Daniela Anello.  I have also interviewed the leaders of Mundo Verde PCS, Thurgood Mashall PCS, DC International PCS, Appletree Early Leaning Center PCS, Carlos Rosario International PCS, Washington Yu Ying PCS, Eagle Academy PCS, Elsie Whitlow Stokes Community Freedom PCS, Two Rivers PCS, E.L. Haynes PCS, and the academic director of Center City PCS, which are all 2017 Tier 1 schools.  Just last year I spoke to LaTonya Henderson, the executive director of Cedar Tree Academy PCS.  This school nearly closed years ago.  Coming up is a conversation with the head of school for Sela PCS which is also in this category.

I am so proud of these institutions that are demonstrating that the academic achievement gap really can be closed.  Cheers!

One surprising finding is the number of Tier 3 schools.  Last year there were only four.  This year there are nine.  Some of the names on this list are also jolting because we associate them in our minds as high performers such as Harmony PCS, Democracy Prep Congress Heights PCS, Achievement Preparatory Academy PCS – Wahler Place Elementary School, Cesar Chavez PCS for Public Policy – Parkside Middle School, and Seed PCS middle school, although its high school is in the Tier 1 category.  Two of these charters are in this tier for the second year in a row, Achievement Prep PCS and National Collegiate Preparatory PCS, which is troubling.

To end this discussion on a positive note, Rocketship PCS is un-ranked this year because last term was its first, but its PMF score demonstrates that it would be in the first Tier, a commitment it made when it opened.

The Washington Post’s Valerie Strauss reported Monday that the DC Public Charter School Board violated city law when it proceeded to approve two charter amendment requests at its May meeting involving D.C. Prep PCS.

As you recall, the board gave the green light to one of three charter amendment requests from this school at its April meeting, which dealt with the relocation of its Anacostia Elementary School.  But two other requests involving replication were turned down due to concerns about the D.C. Prep’s student suspension rate, which is higher than the charter sector average.  After this action was taken, the board received widespread criticism for taking into account suspension rates when denying growth of a school since this factor is not included in either its criteria for charter expansion or the School Reform Act.

Then, in a surprise at the PCSB’s June meeting, member Don Soifer reintroduced the two charter amendments for D.C. Prep that were rejected a couple of months prior.  This time however, after the school’s chief executive officer and founder Emily Lawson was able to testify and attenuate concerns over student suspensions, the motion passed in the affirmative.

So the matter was closed.  Well, not exactly.  The problem was that the D.C. Prep charter amendments were never part of the June meeting agenda and therefore the public had no opportunity to comment before the second vote.  This led DCPS parent and blogger Valerie Jablow to make a formal complaint to the D.C. Office of Open Government.  Here’s what she said, according to Ms. Strauss:

“At the DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) meeting on March 20, 2017, several citizens and public interest groups either submitted written testimony or testified in person against a petition by DC Prep for an enrollment increase that would allow it to open a new elementary school and a middle school. Some opposition was based on DC Prep’s high student suspension rates, and the overcapacity in available seats that already exists among all DCPS and charter schools.

At its next meeting, on April 24, 2017, the PCSB denied DC Prep’s petition, citing concerns about suspension rates at DC Prep among other reasons.

On June 19, 2017, the PCSB held its most recent regularly scheduled monthly meeting. The agenda for that meeting was posted a day or so in advance of the meeting, on the charter board website. DC Prep was on the agenda for a charter amendment to its Performance Management Framework (PMF), but not for an enrollment increase.

At about an hour and a half into the June 19, 2017, meeting, one of the board members, Don Soifer, introduced additions to the agenda for the evening, citing Robert’s Rules of Order. The first addition was to renew DC Prep’s application to amend its charter to add a middle school, with a corresponding increase in students. The second addition to the agenda was for DC Prep to add an elementary school, along with a corresponding enrollment increase. The board voted to add both items to the agenda, with the vote on each to occur later in the evening.

So it was that at its June 19, 2017, meeting, without any notice to the public, the PCSB reconsidered and then reversed its April 24, 2017 decision, approving DC Prep’s petition to create two new charter schools. Before the June 19, 2017 meeting, the public had no idea this was going to be reconsidered and voted upon that evening. This is a violation of the charter board’s own rules for public notification.

It also is a violation of the District’s Open Meetings law, as the lack of any public notice that the DC Prep expansion vote would be revisited in all practical effect made the June 19 PCSB meeting a closed meeting, particularly with respect to those who had opposed the petition the first time around.

In addition, the PCSB failed to post at least one public comment on the DC Prep petition ahead of time. This too is a violation of the charter board’s own rules.

In response to a question from another member of the public about that reconsideration vote on June 19, 2017, a charter board staff member (Tomeika Bowden) sent the following:

‘Robert’s Rules of Order allows for board members to request to add items to the agenda during the meeting. Additionally, Robert’s Rules of Order advises that a prepared agenda should not prevent members from bringing up business items. In this case, the DC Prep items voted on at the June meeting were identical in substance to those voted on previously, which already went through the complete public hearing and comment process. The public had ample time to provide comments and testimony, which the Board received and considered in its decision. If the items added to the agenda were materially different or new, we would have held a new public comment process to ensure adequate notice.’

There is also a related problem of considering and making available all public comments received on the DC Prep petition.

The day before the June 19, 2017 PCSB meeting, on June 18, I emailed Ms. Bowden at the charter board, along with Scott Pearson, the executive director, and Darren Woodruff, the board chair, noting that my comments on the original proposals from DC Prep and KIPP DC (which I submitted by the charter board’s March 20 deadline) were not listed on the materials for the June 19 board meeting. I re-sent my comments to them in that same email.

Later on June 18, Darren Woodruff sent my comments to all the charter board members and copied me via email. But it wasn’t until days after that June 19 board meeting that my comments on KIPP DC appeared on the posted materials for the June 19 board meeting. And my comments on DC Prep have never been posted with any board materials for DC Prep at any time.

Moreover, in the materials for the March 20, 2017 PCSB meeting, a staff memo (dated that same day) noted that the DC Prep proposal, which was to be discussed but not voted on during the 3/20 meeting, had no public comment. That was not true—I had submitted my comments by then, as had others.

When the DC Prep proposal came up for a vote on April 24, 2017, only one public comment in opposition to DC Prep was posted with the board materials the day prior to the April 24 meeting. That was a comment by Suzanne Wells that was made at the March 20, 2017 PCSB hearing.

Finally, and worst of all, no one commented against the DC Prep proposal for the June 19, 2017, board meeting because no one knew before the June 19 meeting that this proposal was going to be re-visited and voted on by PCSB. While the public had been allowed to comment on the DC Prep petition before the March 20, 2017 PCSB hearing, new information about DC Prep’s suspension rates was learned at the April 24, 2017 PCSB hearing.

In addition, the public had every confidence that once the PCSB had denied the DC Prep enrollment increase petition in April, it would not be up for consideration again without further public notice. As it is, members of the public might have testified if they knew there was a likelihood two additional schools would open in Ward 7, where there is already an overcapacity of school seats in Ward 7 at the elementary, middle, and high school levels.

The charter board needs to suspend the vote they took on June 19, 2017, approving both the new elementary and middle schools for DC Prep. They need to announce this addition to their work agenda anew; open it up for public comment; ensure that the public comment is in fact posted well ahead of the meeting; and have another meeting to vote on it.

This would allow people who had no idea DC Prep’s proposal was going to be re-visited and re-voted upon a chance to testify in person or create new comments (and ensure they get posted).

The fact that the proposal for DC Prep was the same as it stood before the vote in April is a moot point: if the public doesn’t even know something is being considered, and voted on, the public is left in the dark not because it chooses to be, but because the public has no other choice.

Moreover, the only people who knew DC Prep’s proposal was under consideration at the June 19 PCSB meeting were those who stood to benefit from it materially: the school itself and the charter board, which depends on its funding in large part from fees from individual charter schools. This raises conflict of interest issues as well.”

In a ten page ruling dated August 9, 2017 the D.C. Office of Open Government sided with Ms. Jablow.  It reads in part:

“As previously stated, there was reliance by the DCPCSB on the “Renew the Motion” pursuant to Robert’s Rules of Order to bring the two disapproved DC Prep charter amendments back before the body for reconsideration on June 19, 2017.  Normally, revising a public body’s draft meeting agenda for adoption as the final meeting agenda under the protocol the OOG has provided to public bodies would present no affront to the OMA [Open Meetings Act] or SRA [School Reform Act]. However, the DCPCSB’s enabling legislation is unique.  The statute requires, without limiting language, for all DCPCSB’s meetings to be open to the public with a reasonable period for public comment on the agenda items.  It is also for this reason that DCPCSB’s “Renew the Motion” was not a lawful means to revise the DCPCSB draft meeting agenda before adoption as the final agenda.  This is because revising the DCPCSB draft meeting agenda at the start of its meeting to include additional items that require a public hearing and a period of public comment voids the statutory public notice and period for public comment mandated by the SRA.”

The Office of Open Government is not asking that the decision on D.C. Prep be reversed, and charter board spokesperson Tomeika Bowden states that the board will not revisit the vote.  It will, however, follow the law going forward and institute training on how to comply with its regulations.

The most ironic part of this whole story is that the findings of the Office of Open Government would normally be signed by its director Traci Hughes.  However, Ms. Hughes had to recuse herself in this case.  You see, she has a child that attends D.C. Prep.

On the agenda of last night’s monthly meeting of the DC Public Charter School Board was a public hearing regarding a proposed charter amendment for the Latin American Youth Center Career Academy Public Charter School to move into a new facility.  During testimony from the school’s representatives it was revealed that the charter lost its lease due to its landlord’s uncertainty as to whether the school would continue to exist as it faced five months of discussion over charter revocation.  You will remember that in May the board finally decided to end its drive to close the school, a process that in retrospect never should have been initiated.

But the loss of a facility is not the only fallout from the board’s action.  Members of LAYCCA also indicated that the threat to shutter the charter also resulted in the departure of students and staff.  The school has now hired a recruitment specialist to get its enrollment back up to its 200 pupil level.

The identification and securing of facilities is the greatest problem facing charters in the nation’s capital and across the country.  The issue has forced schools to locate in church basements, warehouses, and storefronts.  Fortunately for LAYCCA it will be able to move only two blocks into the same dilapidated building on 16th Street, N.W. in Columbia Heights that once housed Mundo Verde PCS and D.C. International PCS.

Do you think the PCSB apologized for all of the trouble that it has put this school through unnecessarily?  Not a contrite word was uttered.  The members only asked questions such as the one from Rick Cruz, the only board member to vote against LAYCCA in May, who asked about the progress of the $500,000 CityBridge Breakthrough Schools grant.  The school indicated it has recently issued a request for proposal to assist with fulfilling the goals of the award.

The relocation was of course approved and the people from LAYCCA were once again the epitome of professionalism as they were from last winter through the spring as their future was being decided.  From an earlier post about the schools:

“The Youth Center is serving adult students with an average education on a sixth grade level.  This is the average.  Almost all of those enrolled have faced tremendous obstacles throughout their lives from drug addiction, homelessness, poverty, and incarceration.  Needless to say, these are not individuals from typical two-parent households.  Then what this school does, and I have no idea how they do this, is they take these disadvantaged people and put them back together.  The charter demonstrated that many attendees are able to gain years of learning under their watch.  As was stated yesterday evening, Frederick Douglass remarked that, “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.”  But somehow, in consistent irrefutable evidence presented by the staff and the board of directors, fixing broken human beings is exactly what this charter is accomplishing.”

Yesterday was also the final board meeting for PCSB member Sara Mead as her term is up after eight years of volunteer service.  She will be missed as she consistently provided a rational and thoughtful voice, especially in her specialty area of early childhood education.

Things just don’t appear to be going well this year for the DC Public Charter School Board.  It started 2017 with a debate over whether to begin charter revocation proceedings against the Latin American Youth Center Career Academy.  The move resulted in the school hiring attorney Stephen Marcus, the same lawyer handling the FOCUS coordinated lawsuit against the city regarding inequitable funding of charters compared to the traditional school sector.  In March, the board did vote to proceed only to reverse course over an aggravatingly long five months and decide that conditionally the school that bravely serves severely disadvantaged adults can continue to operate.

At the same time that this was going on, Mayor Bowser surprised the charter sector by introducing a plan for a walkability preference for student admission.  The idea represents the first step in satisfying Ms. Bowser’s notion that charters should look more like DCPS in giving a first right of refusal to access to classrooms to those students living closest to these facilities.  Despite the fact that this suggestion flies in the face of the main component of  charter schools, namely school choice, Scott Pearson, the executive director of the PCSB, called the idea an “interesting enrollment proposal that addresses real issues families face.”  So far no final determination has been reached.

Moving on to February, the teachers at Paul PCS sought to unionize, which would have made the school the first charter in D.C. to take this step.  Across the country only 10 percent of charters have union representation of teachers.  The activity came 60 days after an article by Mr. Pearson suggesting that charters could benefit from a union presence.  The leadership of Paul fought back, and a vote to join a group affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers went down in defeat but not before the school’s executive director of ten years, Jami Dunham, decided to retire.  The union, however, did not give up trying to get a foothold in our city, and just this month the teachers at Cesar Chavez PCS’s Prep campus decided to become part of the AFT.

In March, the State Board of Education approved an education plan for the District of Columbia as part of the national Every Student Succeeds Act that ranks all of our city’s public schools under the same accountability system administered by the Office of the State Superintendent of Education.  This came as a huge surprise to those of us used to seeing charters graded under the PCSB’s Performance Management Framework tool.  The PCSB’s executive director issued a statement supporting the uniform assessment of schools; the Center for Education Reform has a different opinion.

In April, it was announced by the PCSB that D.C. charter school student wait lists has risent to nearly 10,000 students.

Finally, there was the debacle around DC Prep’s request to open new middle school and elementary school campuses.  Despite being assured by the PCSB staff that the vote was only a formality, the charter faced an onslaught of criticism over its above average out-of-school suspension rates.  The additional campuses were defeated, which resulted in the former executive director of FOCUS Robert Cane calling out the board for taking an action not authorized under the School Reform Act during his acceptance speech after being inducted into the organization’s Hall of Fame.   Six weeks from its original vote, the PCSB changed its mind and is letting DC Prep go ahead with its expansion plans.

On a positive note, three new charter were given the green light to open during the 2018 to 2019 school year.  Eight schools originally applied.

Late yesterday afternoon, the DC Public Charter School Board voted at a special meeting six to one to allow the Latin American Youth Center Career Academy Public Charter School to continue operating under a new set of conditions, most of them tied to results of the Adult Education Performance Management Framework.  Only board member Rick Cruz cast his ballot against the measure, arguing that the school failed to meet several of the goals contained in its charter.

There were a number of common themes around last night’s discussion.  All board members thanked the school and the PCSB staff for their exceedingly hard work around the issue of charter revocation that first surfaced during the five year review of LAYCCA in January of this year.  There was also a lot of whining.  They complained that the school should have come to the PCSB quicker when it realized that based upon the low academic preparation of its student body, the original charter goals were unrealistic.  There were assertions that the systems relied upon by the charter for administrative tracking of data were weak.  The members also found that many of the targets were subjective and therefore open to interpretation.

The most interesting remarks came from Sara Mead.  She chastised the board for accepting the school’s goals in the first place because they were unclear and vague.  She also made the point that while there is a tremendous need in the nation’s capital to meet the needs of adult learners, she is not quite sure that attempts to provide these services fit “naturally” into the adult charter school model.  She cautioned the board about approving other charter applications that seek to educate a similar population of students.  Dovetailing nicely on her statement, board member Steve Bumbaugh pointed out that there is evidence that those enrolled at LAYCCA have shown academic improvement, especially in the area of reading.  He concluded that in light of the “multiple risk factors” of pupils LAYCCA is serving, “this is no small matter.”

In the end the PCSB made the correct decision and one that was predicted here.  As I wrote last month:

“The Youth Center is serving adult students with an average education on a sixth grade level.  This is the average.  Almost all of those enrolled have faced tremendous obstacles throughout their lives from drug addiction, homelessness, poverty, and incarceration.  Needless to say, these are not individuals from typical two-parent households.  Then what this school does, and I have no idea how they do this, is they take these disadvantaged people and put them back together.  The charter demonstrated that many attendees are able to gain years of learning under their watch.  As was stated yesterday evening, Frederick Douglass remarked that, “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.”  But somehow, in consistent irrefutable evidence presented by the staff and the board of directors, fixing broken human beings is exactly what this charter is accomplishing.”

Last Monday evening over at Friendship PCS’s Armstrong Campus, the DC Public Charter School Board heard presentations from five schools that wish to open in the 2018 to 2019 school year.  Two of these are ready to join the local movement.  Let’s quickly go through the list.

The Adult Career Technical Education Public Charter School wants to provide students “ages of 16-24, [an] academic and career technical education that leads to high school credentials, postsecondary training, and career paths to productive and economically sound lifestyles.”  When the board was listening to the representatives from the school, red flags were obviously raised in their minds regarding the recent experience with the Latin American Youth Center Career Academy PCS in which this charter school that also serves adults found that its population of students was much further behind academically than anticipated.  I was less than satisfied when this applicant answered how it would address a similar student body so I don’t believe the charter will be approved.

Citizens of the World Public Charter School proposes to open two campuses that will initially serve pre-Kindergarten to fifth grade students, but will eventually go through high school.  It should definitely be allowed to do just as it plans.  The charter is actually an experienced operator with existing schools in Kansas City, New York, and Los Angeles.  The founders for the D.C. campus spent four years on the ground working with stakeholders on adapting their model to local conditions.  It was one of the best applications I have seen in a long time.

CyberTech High School Public Charter School’s application calls for instructing 400 students in Ward 5 to provide them with the technical training to work in the information technology profession.  The discussion around the dais focused on the concept of mindfulness that will be woven throughout the curriculum.  While the emphasis on this approach seemed well understood by the founders, along with their desire to open in one particular Ward in the city, the overall structure of the curriculum did not.  This charter should go back to the drawing board to base its school on a model that is already working well academically in another locality.

Digital Pioneers Academy Public Charter School would open in Ward 7 or 8 as a middle and high school initially enrolling 360 students in grades six through eight in its first three years of operation.  This application of a charter that would teach computer science knocked it out of the park.  In fact, the board was openly complimentary about the proposed program.  Perhaps all you really need to know is that one member of the founding group is Justin Cohen.  I first met Mr. Cohen when he was DCPS’s director of portfolio management under Michelle Rhee.  I was speaking to him about bringing an art infused curriculum to the traditional school system when I was board chair of the William E. Doar, Jr PCS for the Performing Arts.  He went on to form his own nonprofit that was centered on school turnarounds.   Mr. Cohen wrote much of Digital Pioneer’s highly detailed application.  He is an extremely impressive individual. However, I don’t want to take anything away from the experience of the other representatives of the school that were equally talented.  If a group of people want to study how to open a new charter, they should study this proposal.

The final applicant for the evening was The Family Place Public Charter School.  This charter would provide adult literacy education to immigrants to this country, primarily those coming from Central America.  I have to say I was fascinated by this proposal. It turns out that The Family Place has been around since 1980.  It was founded by Dr. Ann Barnet, a pediatrician practicing at Children’s Hospital.  It is currently serving 700 families a year from its headquarters on 16th Street, N.W. providing adult education in a two-generational model.  It strives to “meet the students where they are” while at the same time offering wraparound services to keep the grownups in school.  This support may come in the form of meals, social services, and childcare up to the age of five.

My heart wants The Family Place to be approved due to its tremendous mission and the work that it is already doing, but my head says that the application needs some additional refinement.  The charter would co-exist with the original organization, and I believe further delineation is needed to create solid lines between the responsibilities of each entity.  In addition, the charter established a goal of having 50 percent of its 150 students take the pre- and post-ESL exam, while the group’s track record over the past several years has been an average of 63 percent of its students reaching this milestone.  I hope that The Family Place will re-apply next year.

So between this meeting and the last of new school applications, I count three new charters being approved:  Washington School of Arts and Academics PCS, Citizens of the World PCS, and Digital Pioneers Academy PCS.  This would give a 43 percent acceptance rate, which is consistent with the overall past PCSB track record.

After listening to the two new charter school applications at last week’s monthly meeting of the DC Public Charter School Board I retired for the night.  After all, there was nothing particularly noteworthy on the agenda, only a few administrative matters that I was certain would sail through the approval process as has been the meticulously orchestrated routine in the past.

But then members of our local charter movement began contacting me.  “Did you see what happened at the charter board meeting regarding D.C. Prep?”  This was not a mundane question.  These individuals were upset.  So I decided to watch the video.  I then understood the reasons behind their highly emotional reactions.

D.C. Prep PCS was requesting three charter amendments.  They were “1) an enrollment ceiling increase of 846 students from its current ceiling of 2,056 students by SY 2019-2020, to 2,912 students by SY 2024-2025; 2) a two-part program replication to open a new elementary campus by school year (“SY”) 2018-2019, and a new middle school campus (“Anacostia Middle”) by SY 2020-2021; and 3) to relocate its existing Anacostia Elementary School to a new, permanent location at 1409 V Street, SE in Ward 8, beginning in SY 2017-2018.”

The PCSB staff wholeheartedly recommended that the board approve these changes.  The report regarding the proposed amendments contained the following unambiguous language:

“Founded in 2003, DC Prep PCS is one of the top performing networks of charter schools in the District, has met its goals and academic achievement expectations at both its 5- year and 10-year reviews, and has been Tier 1 since the inception of DC PCSB’s Performance Management Framework. Notably, some of the school’s greatest strengths are its high academic achievement, its willingness to serve all students—especially those from underserved communities, and its strong infrastructure that provides invaluable professional development and leadership training for staff.”

In fact, the school met nine out of ten criteria for replication according to the DC PCSB Charter Agreement Amendment Guidelines, missing the mark on only one because it has not yet identified permanent locations for its proposed Anacostia middle school and the new Ward 7 or 8 elementary school.

The PCSB staff also pointed out that despite having five campuses, D.C. Prep currently has 683 students on its wait-list.  These pupils are most likely all from low-income families.

So as I suspected, everything was in place for a regular approval of a charter amendment.  But the situation quickly became strange.  First, without explanation, board member Saba Bireda recused herself from the vote.  Then when the session opened for questions board member Steve Bumbaugh asked about the high proportion of out-of-school suspensions occurring at this charter management organization, inquiring as to whether the suspensions are “a mechanism for managing the school.”  It was then board chairman Dr. Darren Woodruff’s turn to pick up the same theme.  He indicated that at Anacostia Elementary the out-of-school suspension rate this school year is 6.9 percent, with the charter sector average at 3.7 percent.  Dr. Woodruff went on to relate that for students with I.E.P.’s, D.C. Prep has an out-of-school suspension rate of 40 percent.  Pointing to the Edgewood Middle School Campus, the PCSB chair stated that the out-of-school suspension rate this year is 27.9 percent compared to 18 percent last year, with the rate for special education students at 44.9 percent.

The representative present from D.C. Prep, Mr. Raymond Weeden, the school’s senior director of policy and community engagement, was clearly not prepared for this onslaught of criticism of the school’s suspension data.

The amendment regarding the relocation of Anacostia passed without incident.  However, the out-of-school suspension rate at Anacostia was particularly problematic for Dr. Woodruff because he realized that the students being disciplined are Kindergartners.  He opined, “I am struggling mightily to understand the logic behind suspending out-of-school five year olds.  I know that you don’t have a response to that.  But I have been in education for over 30 years and I can’t come up with an explanation that makes sense.  So, I recognize that this is one of our high performing operators but this is an issue that we have hinted at, talked about, and danced around, and we have not seen significant improvement.  I would love to hear anyone from your organization justify a 40 percent suspension rate for five year olds that have disabilities.  That’s the reason I will not vote for the expansion.”

To complete the peculiarity of the proceedings, Ms. Bireda then un-recused herself for the replicate vote.  Apparently, and I’m not understanding the logic behind this, she didn’t believe she should cast a ballot on the relocation of Anacostia elementary because she lives close to the new site.  But the dye was already cast, and therefore following Dr. Woodruff’s passionate remarks the two amendments related to replication failed on four to three votes.

The staff report does comment on D.C. Prep’s suspension rates.  It concludes:

“The school has historically had higher out-of-school suspension rates than comparable schools in the charter sector, however in the past two years these rates have declined considerably. Per its charter amendment application, the LEA is diligently working to decrease its suspension rate over time.  The school reports that it revised its discipline policy to be more lenient regarding the types of infractions that warrant an out-of-school suspension.  Additionally, the school has implemented more strategic efforts to engage parents immediately following behavioral incidents, such as requesting an in-person parent meeting, rather than automatically suspending the student. DC PCSB staff have documented a decrease in the suspension rate at all campuses and in many cases a significant drop in school-wide or subgroup suspensions, though most rates are still above charter averages.”

I have heard Mr. Scott Pearson, the PCSB’s executive director, proudly state on more than one occasion that his group has been highly successful in lowering suspension rates simply by making the information transparent instead of having to rely on rules and regulations.  But now it appears that this approach is being revisited.  We are now seeing, without notice, modifications to the criteria under which a school can expand, a division between staff recommendations and the actions of the board, and an intrusion of the PCSB into out-of-school suspension policies, an area not covered under the School Reform Act.

Unfortunately for D.C. Prep, it was the first charter to learn of the sea change.