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LAT: California's State Board of Education votes to close 2 Celerity charter schools

Tripon

Member
California’s State Board of Education voted unanimously Thursday to shutter two Los Angeles charter schools run by a nonprofit that is under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education and the inspector general for the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Some parents and teachers at the schools cried through their testimony at an emotional hearing, which ended with the board declining to renew the charter petitions for the Celerity Dyad Charter School in South Los Angeles and the Celerity Troika Charter School in Eagle Rock. Explaining their vote, board members said they had lost confidence in the Celerity Educational Group, the organization that manages the schools, and expressed growing concerns about its governance structure and finances, as well as the potential for conflicts of interest.

“This seems to be a very troubling failure on the part of the adults who manage these organizations, rather than on the adults in the classrooms,” said board member Ilene Straus.

The board’s vote comes at a time when charter school advocates are determined to increase the number of such schools in L.A., and it highlights the growing difficulty of regulating them. The state’s teachers union, which has fought against the growth in charter schools, has argued that all control over which charter schools are approved or rejected should rest with local school districts, rather than county or state boards.

http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-edu-celerity-troika-dyad-renewal-20170511-story.html


Celerity has been accused of misusing school funds, resulting in a federal raid earlier in the year.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1347200&highlight=celerity
 

BigDug13

Member
You can't privatize primary services like healthcare, education, and prisons. It only encourages damage to humans for profit. For things like prisons and charter schools, that's regular tax money that was already being collected now being funneled into these privately owned pockets who can skimp on what they provide with that money. The public version might have had waste from a lethargic beurocracy, but the alternative of just handing all that tax money over to people who are guaranteed to try to profit is insane.
 
I think the shit really hit the fan when it was discovered the main curriculum was this:

QYCoyT7.gif


Celery man
 

thefro

Member
You can't privatize primary services like healthcare, education, and prisons. It only encourages damage to humans for profit. For things like prisons and charter schools, that's regular tax money that was already being collected now being funneled into these privately owned pockets who can skimp on what they provide with that money. The public version might have had waste from a lethargic beurocracy, but the alternative of just handing all that tax money over to people who are guaranteed to try to profit is insane.

This was a "non-profit" charter school.
 

Tripon

Member
I think the shit really hit the fan when it was discovered the main curriculum was this:

QYCoyT7.gif


Celery man

You joke, but there's been a couple of charter schools who have tried to differentiate themselves by saying their main curriculum offers competitive dance courses.
 

Do Better

Member
You can't privatize primary services like healthcare, education, and prisons. It only encourages damage to humans for profit. For things like prisons and charter schools, that's regular tax money that was already being collected now being funneled into these privately owned pockets who can skimp on what they provide with that money. The public version might have had waste from a lethargic beurocracy, but the alternative of just handing all that tax money over to people who are guaranteed to try to profit is insane.

America, where we think everything should be run like a business and vote against our own self interests to make it possible for someone to get rich off of the services we need.
 
Good, charters have shown no reason to continue them. They're either skimping on education for profit, they're shooting for employee hostility, or they're modern day white flight schools.
 

Tripon

Member
Good, charters have shown no reason to continue them. They're either skimping on education for profit, they're shooting for employee hostility, or they're modern day white flight schools.

The two schools are located in Eagle Rock and South L.A.

Eagle Rock is a diverse area (but doable to create a majority white school, I guess), and South L.A. is majority black and Hispanic.

I would actually be impressed if any school, charter, district run or private was able to create a white flight school in South L.A.
 

AndyD

aka andydumi
You joke, but there's been a couple of charter schools who have tried to differentiate themselves by saying their main curriculum offers competitive dance courses.

The thing is that's where the charter school model could really thrive. In specializing in things and offering courses and experiences in that field beyond what a normal school could by partnering with a company or adult professionals. Offer a really good computer science program, foreign languages, mechanics, art, specific sports and so forth.

Of course that locks the students into that particular path, but say at high school level, it's not unheard of.
 

Volimar

Member
The thing is that's where the charter school model could really thrive. In specializing in things and offering courses and experiences in that field beyond what a normal school could by partnering with a company or adult professionals. Offer a really good computer science program, foreign languages, mechanics, art, specific sports and so forth.

Of course that locks the students into that particular path, but say at high school level, it's not unheard of.


Fame! I wanna live forever~
 
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