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Ohio Auditor Jim Petro's office about four weeks ago released an audit and a corresponding news release for reform of the state's charter school program. (Ohio's enabling legislation refers to these as "community" schools so I'll go with that nomenclature.) Ohio community schools are run by non-profit organizations but are mainly funded by the state on a per-pupil basis as if they were little public school districts of their own. This guarantees the schools a reasonable funding base, but it also obligates them to act with more restrictions than a truly private school.
As an aside, this explains the reports that 99% of Cleveland students using vouchers do so at religious schools. The secular schools that might otherwise accept vouchers now have chosen to organize themselves as community schools instead--for the much more stable source of funding. To have community schools that teach religion, on the other hand, would obviously and indisputably offend the First Amendment, so they are relegated to accepting the much lesser and more indirect level of funding offered by vouchers.
Anyway, the main thing I came away from the audit report was that, astoundingly, the recommendations make sense. I hope the state Department of Education takes the advice seriously, but no big deal if they don't; the legislature is prepared to hand control of the community school process over to a new commission if they're unhappy with the department's response to the audit's reform proposals.
Most importantly, Petro's office blamed the Ohio Department of Education for administering the community school program with "limited ability." They're recommending that the department lose its ability to charter schools directly, instead designating "sponsors" throughout Ohio who would in turn grant charters. "The pool of potential sponsors," said the report, "should be widened to include all traditional school districts, municipalities and private non-profit organizations to allow for a wider range of educational models."
The audit points out where state community school law is unclear, vague, or completely absent. It also suggests funding and accounting changes including more frequent checks on the all-important enrollment and attendance numbers provided by schools.
Petro's office found that thirty-eight percent of all second-year community schools entered the 1999-2000 year with a fund deficit. This result is difficult to excuse given the schools' guaranteed state funding source--you know how much you're taking in, you have an idea what the expenses could be, how can you mess up the budget?
The audit also recommended that community schools should not be allowed to overlap directors with the nonprofit service organizations to which many of them outsource their work. I don't think that's a bad thing--nobody wants to look at their own kids' school and think "Enron."
Community schools in general need to remember that they are on the sharp point of that public-private partnership wedge. Being allocated thousands of dollars per child per year in state money is a huge responsibility; the community school boards are obligated to discharge it cleanly and effectively, and to be seen to do so.
A realistic state audit is the first step to shaping up the community school program. In spite of their little faults and obvious failures, Ohio community schools provide a reasonably good, cost-effective alternative to traditional district schools, and offer a model for experimentation that would be impossible to duplicate in the big-city districts that need change the most.
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