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Published Tuesday, December 15, 2009 in Local

State OKs Senoia Charter school

By Jeff Bishop

The Times-Herald

The Georgia Charter Schools Commission Monday approved the proposed Senoia charter school along with six other new state-chartered schools.

The Coweta County Board of Education turned down the application of Georgia Charter Educational Foundation, Inc. / Charter Schools USA last summer, but the decision was appealed to the Georgia Charter Schools Commission.

The commission is an independent panel created by state lawmakers to give groups interested in opening a charter school another place they can apply aside from their local school board.

The current process in Georgia -- which requires groups wanting charters to initially approach boards of education -- is extremely challenging, according to those who have gone through the process.

"It's kind of like if Burger King had to go and get permission from McDonald's to open," said Richard Page, vice president of operations for Florida-based Charter Schools USA.

Senoia City Councilman Larry Owens said Monday afternoon that the approval is a "fine feather in the cap" for Senoia.

"I think it is great," said Owens. "I think this is one of the really good things that has happened to Senoia."

Owens said he doesn't really know a lot of details about the commission's decision but the new school should be "excellent for the city... one of the best things that has happened around here in quite some time."

It was due to "a lot of hard work of a lot of folks that it was approved," he said.

State Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox said that she "fully supports" the commission's decision.

"I fully support high-quality charter schools because they give choices to parents and students and also come with the same accountability as all public schools.

"After the approval of seven new Commission charter schools today, it is apparent that the Commission used a rigorous process to ensure that quality public school options continue to be available for Georgia school children. We look forward to working with the Commission to ensure that these new schools achieve the rigorous student achievement goals set forth in their charters," she said.

The approved schools are in districts in Atlanta, Fulton County, DeKalb County, Coweta County, Henry County, Paulding County and a group of small counties in southwest Georgia.

One school, The Museum School of Avondale Estates, will partner with museums so students can go on learning expeditions.

Charter schools are public schools started by parents, businesses or community members that have more flexibility in how they meet federal education benchmarks.

Odyssey School, a stand-alone charter school located on St. John's Circle in Shenandoah Industrial Park in Coweta County, holds a state charter and gets no local funds. Odyssey receives about 60 percent of what is spent per student in the local system.

By going through the process required by the state commission, charter schools may be able to get funding close to what is spent in the local system.

Coweta school board members said when they turned down the petition earlier this year that the board had "numerous concerns."

Coweta Schools Superintendent Blake Bass said at the time that the proposed school would be out of compliance with the Charter Schools Act of 1998, which requires that charter schools "shall be issued only to non-profit corporations organized and operated under the laws of the state of Georgia."

Bass said the Georgia Charter Foundation, Inc. is a "foreign non-profit corporation" formed under the laws of the state of Florida.

The petitioner also "has no prior experience in operating a school," Bass and the school board said at the time.

"The charter petitioner plans to place the sole responsibility of running the day-to-day operations of the school with Charter Schools USA, Inc., a Florida for-profit company," Bass said.

"However, the charter petitioner had advised the Coweta County School System that it has not yet entered into an agreement with Charter Schools USA for the operation of the school, and has further advised that the sample contract contained in the charter petition is not the exact contract that it plans on entering into with Charter Schools USA."

The school system cannot approve the application without knowing the "precise terms and conditions of the agreement" for the operation of the school, he said.

The school system also said it was concerned that the foundation has not yet acquired the property on which the school would be constructed, and that there was "only one special education teacher budgeted in the petition."

"As compared to the CEC petitions, which were driven by process that forced clear agreed agreements to precede the charter petition's filing, we find the CSUSA petition to be speculative and open-ended," he said, comparing the proposal with the Central Educational Center's founding.

But Owens said that the residents of Senoia seem much more supportive.

"It took a lot of hard work from a lot of folks to make this happen, and I'm glad that it did," said Owens.

This will be "a really major thing for the eastern part of the county," he said. "It's the result of a lot of hard work and a lot of effort and a lot of concern on a lot of people's part -- the legislative folks, the community concern and the community effort behind it.

"The community support behind having the charter school has really been overwhelming," he said. "It just shows that there is strength in numbers, when people decide that they want to try to make something happen."

When Charter Schools USA applied to Coweta County for a charter it was operating 21 schools on 16 campuses -- all in Florida.

Georgia is Charter Schools USA's first major push outside Florida.

While the company has no specific target to spread to a specified number of states within a certain time frame, Page said he does believe the southeastern United States is an area "where our model is replicable."

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