Taxpayers should not be paying for phantom students

After releasing his report on Charter school attendance, the Auditor appears on Captiol Insider and had this to say, according to the Dispatch

Ohio Auditor Dave Yost said he was left “speechless” by the discrepancies in attendance his investigators found during surprise visits to 30 charter schools.

Half of the schools had significantly lower attendance than they had reported to the state. Investigators found no students at one school.

Yet the former prosecutor’s 56-page report released last week said he did not determine whether the schools were cheating and couldn’t say whether they had bilked taxpayers, Dispatch Reporter Catherine Candisky notes.

It almost doesn't matter. Of course we must still demand a real investigation, and if fraud has been occurring arrests and indictments must happen, but what the Auditor truly revealed is the massive on-going over-payment to charter schools for students they are not teaching.

If Charter schools are regularly teaching <100% of the students they claim to have, they should not be receiving 100% of the state aid, transferred from local school districts

. These millions of dollars in over-payments due to lax reporting and oversight are bad for taxpayers and terrible for traditional public school students who are being deprived of funding they should be receiving if these charters were billing correctly.

The legislature needs to take a long hard look at how and when money is transferred to charter schools and ensure they are only being paid for student that are actually in their classrooms. No more payments for phantom students

Ohio charter schools may be charging taxpayers for empty seats; Akron’s White Hat among those cited

Thirty auditors fanned out across Ohio last fall to count the students sitting in 30 charter schools and compare totals with the numbers those schools claimed in order to receive taxpayer dollars.

In a school in Youngstown, they found zero students, though the school had received enough state aid to educate 152. Dropout recovery schools operated by Akron-based White Hat Management were among the worst.

“I was shocked to find that 50 percent [attendance] seems to be the average” among one particular type of school, said State Auditor Dave Yost, who launched the “old-school” investigation because of recent allegations that charter schools might be inflating enrollment figures.

Yost, a Republican, held a news conference at the statehouse Thursday to announce the findings that create yet one more blemish on Ohio’s $1 billion charter school sector.

The report follows failed proposals by minority House and Senate Democrats who want to reform charter schools. It also comes amid a Republican Senator’s efforts to rewrite Ohio’s charter school law and landed in Columbus a week before supporters descend upon the state capital to celebrate School Choice Week.

(Read more at Ohio.com)

Affluent districts pay less in school taxes by this count

If New Albany-Plain school district residents paid an average amount of their income to fund local education, in relation to all Ohio districts, the district not only could stop worrying about budget cuts, it could more than double spending.

The affluent northeastern Franklin County district could bring in an extra $70 million a year — $15,200 per pupil — if its local tax effort matched the average effort in Ohio, according to an analysis by Howard Fleeter of the Ohio Education Policy Institute.

Neither Fleeter, nor anyone else for that matter, is suggesting New Albany strive for such a goal. But as Gov. John Kasich and state lawmakers again prepare to debate school funding as part of the two-year state budget, he thinks a district’s capacity to generate local revenue should be considered.

“Capacity is a valid point,” Fleeter said. “You can’t just make judgments that your millage rate is low so you need to help yourself before we help you. There are places with low millage rates that really are trying as hard as they ought to be.”

(Read more at the Dispatch)

Fleeter analyzed the local tax-effort index, a state-developed calculation that reflects how much financial effort residents are making to fund their local school district. An index greater than 1 indicates district residents are making an above-average effort, while those less than 1 are below average.

Ohio Charter schools bilking taxpayers for students that don't attend

Before we get to the details of the Auditor of States report titled "Report on Community School Student Attendance", we want to acknowledge the Auditor for carrying out these surprise visits to charter schools to determine the legitimacy of their reported student attendance counts.

The substance of the Auditors report should alarm everyone. A random inspection of 30 schools found that a majority of them are significantly over reporting their student attendance, and consequently receiving significantly more money than they are entitled to. Money that is being drawn from local school districts.

Just how bad is this problem?

One school literally had no students in attendance, despite reporting to ODE that they had 152! When questioned about this, according to the report, "The Director indicated the Academy was engaged in a set of weeklong practice tests for the Ohio Graduation Test (OGT) the week of October 1, 2014. Once the testing was completed each day that week, students were permitted to leave."

The Auditor did another follow up visit a month later, the result indicate fraud on a massive scale

*The Academy’s calendar did not indicate practice testing for the OGT would be taking place the week of October 1, 2014.
*The Auditor of State’s office made an unannounced follow up visit on Monday, November 3, 2014.
*AOS reviewed the OGT practice test documents and related answer sheets from the week of October 1, 2014. AOS noted that the test booklets were from 2004. Each booklet had a student’s name on it along with the answer sheet.
*The number of students present did not correspond to the number of tests given on each day.
*AOS also performed a head count at 10:15 a.m. accounting for 37 students.

The report goes on to detail dozens of charter schools massively over-reporting their attendance in order to receive more money than they are entitled to, many of them giving all manner of weak excuses.

AOS also identified one community school whose educational plan in the sponsor agreement did not authorize a blending learning program; however, management informed AOS during an interview that the school was in fact employing a blended learning curriculum with some student learning opportunities provided in the classroom and some provided online.

Lastly, AOS identified one community school operating a blended learning program as authorized by the sponsor in the educational plan; however, there was no evidence that the community school provided the blended learning declaration to ODE required under Ohio Rev. Code §3302.41(A).

This indicates that not only are the schools themselves operating in a very questionable manner, but their sponsors are asleep at the wheel, and not actively monitoring them.

The magnitude of the potential fraud is staggering, and would be the largest financial scandal in the history of Ohio. Steve Dyer did the math

Yost came up with several recommendations, including more frequent counts, better reporting and practices that allow sponsors and the state to better flag potential issues. But the point is this: We've had charters for 16 years in Ohio. We've spent now about $8.3 billion on them (through the first January payment report). If the headcounts have been as off as they were during this random audit, which was an average of 28%, during the life of the charter school program, then we've paid $2.3 billion for kids that weren't even in the charter schools.

This level of potential fraud requires a statewide investigation and referrals to county prosecutors. Both Charter operators and their sponsors should be held liable to repay all monies they have received for students they have not taught.

Any doubt that the charter experiment in Ohio is out of control can be vanquished. Reform cannot come soon enough.

Here's the Auditors report.

Report on Community School Student Attendance Counts

Columbus Charter School Teachers Seek to Join OEA, Would Become First Unionized Charter School in Central Ohio

Educators and staff at the Franklinton Preparatory Academy (FPA) today informed management of their collective and historic decision to form their own union. The Franklinton Preparatory Academy Educators Association (FPAEA) would be the first union at a central Ohio charter school and will be affiliated with the 121,000 members of the Ohio Education Association. The group will file authorization cards with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on behalf of the overwhelming majority of educators and non-management staff at the school. This triggers an NLRB-supervised election to certify FPAEA as the exclusive bargaining representative, which should take place within 42 days.

The decision of educators and staff to seek representation was inspired by the mission of the Franklinton Preparatory Academy, namely the “premise that all students, irrespective of differences, can learn at high levels and graduate from high school.” As advocates for their students and community, the aspiring FPAEA members will press for comprehensive school safety, adequate educational resources for students, and professional respect.

“Educators, whether they work in a charter or traditional public school, are thoroughly committed to the success of their students,” said Becky Higgins, president of the OEA. “We look forward to welcoming the educators and staff at the Franklinton Preparatory Academy into our union, and working with them to carry on our tradition of improving education and the lives of Ohio's students.”

FPA educators and staff embrace the school’s mission of building “trusting relationships within and among the members of our learning community” and look forward to a mutually respectful and cooperative relationship with FPA administration as they work towards a first union contract.

Head count shows 'unusually high' discrepancies at charter schools

When state auditors made a surprise visit to a Youngstown charter school, they found staff members but no students. Not one.

The students, auditors were told, had been dismissed at 12:30 p.m. after taking a practice graduation test. The Academy for Urban Scholars Youngstown said it had 95 students.

A report released yesterday by Ohio Auditor Dave Yost found significantly lower attendance at half of the 30 charter schools where auditors conducted unannounced head counts this past fall.

The report raises questions about whether the schools receive more tax money than they are entitled because the state relies on student enrollment — reported by the schools — to calculate aid. The privately operated, publicly funded schools get nearly $6,000 per student each year.

“I’m really kind of speechless of everything that I found. It’s quite a morass,” Yost said during a Statehouse news conference.

Among those with the widest gap was Capital High School, 640 Harrisburg Pike, Columbus. The school reported 298 students; auditors counted 142, fewer than half.

School officials did not return a call from The Dispatch yesterday; however, they told auditors that their average daily attendance was 55 to 60 percent, fairly consistent with what investigators found.

Gateway Academy on Kimberly Parkway North in Columbus reported 100 students but auditors counted 52, with 20 students absent.

“They came during lunch, and we only had two classes” in session. Many students were at lunch, some outside the building, said Hydia Green, Gateway principal and superintendent. “To get a true count in my building, you need to come after lunch.”

Classes start at 7:30 a.m. at the school serving students in grades 7 to 12, but many arrive late. To accommodate them and others, the school offers blended learning, in which students can get their lessons online, Green said.

Ohio has about 300 charter schools. Of the 30 examined,

16 had enrollment discrepancies of more than 10 percent.

(Read more at the Dispatch)