I am writing on behalf of the Hollister School District in response to the editorial, “Editorial Special: District shows contempt for charter,” (Hollister Free Lance, November 2, 2012).
The Hollister School District is represented by the administration, in this case, the Superintendent, and by the Board of Trustees. The opinion expressed here, however, is that of the Superintendent.
I must begin my comments by stating that the opinion expressed in the November 2 editorial reflected very strong emotions, and some apparent intent to portray the District in a manner that fits the editor’s views of the district, but it did not represent the facts.
I also must point out that on Tuesday, November 27, 2012 the Hollister School District Board of Trustees took action on a vote of three in favor, and two against, to approve the Charter Petition submitted to the District by Gilroy Prep School (now Navigator Schools). The recommendation from staff to the Board was for approval of the petition, contingent upon the finalization of an operational agreement, and on having a plan in place for the proposed Hollister Prep School’s future Special Education students. Both of those requirements were satisfied.
The Free Lance, in its November 2, 2012 editorial asserted as fact that the “Hollister School District paid a law firm specifically to find ‘deficiencies’ in a charter school petition.” That opinion is in stark contrast to the actual facts, and was stated by the editor even as the editor knew that I clearly denied it. The District did pay a law firm, but not to find reasons to deny the Charter Petition.
Navigator Schools submitted a charter petition to become a public, tax-payer funded, California school serving the students of Hollister. By law, the responsibility to ensure that the tax-payers’ dollars are appropriately allocated, and that the children of Hollister are well served, falls to the Hollister School District. The District doesn’t have the expertise, training or experience, nor do we have staff available, to process a charter petition, especially in the very short, 60-day time frame provided for under the law. The District required the assistance of a legal firm to ensure that the Charter Petition was processed within the required timelines and in a manner that assures the petition adequately addressed all of the required elements, protecting the interests of both tax payers and students.
Once approved, a charter petition is final, unless the Petitioners surrender the charter themselves, or cause it to be revoked. Therefore, school districts must invest the resources necessary to analyze the petition prior to approval. While the Free Lance stated that the review of the petition is, “a process that is set to give trustees like those at the Hollister School District no discretion other than ensuring the application meets five basic requirements in the law,” the law actually provides five grounds, and 16 elements that must be thoroughly reviewed before approving a charter petition. None of these conditions are minor. The District must give each a thorough review prior to recommending approval of the Charter Petition. There will be no opportunity to revise the Petition once it is approved.
The chartering agency, usually a school district, is responsible for oversight of the charter school. Oversight of the charter school includes holding the charter school accountable for meeting measureable pupil outcomes, ensuring that annual independent audits of finances are conducted and deficiencies corrected to the satisfaction of the chartering authority, visiting each charter school at least annually, ensuring that charter schools under its authority comply with all reports required of charter schools by law, monitoring the fiscal condition of each charter school under its authority, and verifying compliance with the charter, any memoranda of agreement, and the law.
The Free Lance stated that the Hollister School District, in its review of the required elements, “nitpicked at the petition,” and “district officials are doing nothing less than harassing Gilroy Prep leaders, with a not-so-subtle intention to create a line of daunting roadblocks,” to encourage, according to the Free Lance, the proposed charter school staff to give up and go away. That statement is not only untrue, it is absurd. With any amount of investigation, the Free Lance would have discovered that the Hollister School District, rather than acting with hostility toward the proposed charter, has developed a positive working relationship with the charter school staff. Furthermore, the feedback provided by the District, based on a review of the petition, and revisions provided by the charter petitioners, resulted in a much improved guiding document – the revised charter petition.
The Free Lance’s boundless opinion in the absence of inquiry was nowhere more evident than in its criticism of the issues that were reviewed, all of which are areas the District is legally required to oversee. Does the Free Lance really have the legal expertise to suggest the District should ignore its responsibilities to the charter review process and the law? Should, as the editor seems to suggest, the Hollister School District simply approve, without thorough review, a charter petition that will generate a budget with expenditures next year in excess of $1,300,000?
The Free Lance cited as claims that were “most irrelevant to the process laid out by the state,” to include “deficiencies in reporting staffing, special education intentions, the school’s governance structure, detailed plans for meeting needs of low achieving or at-risk students, plans to address California’s transition to Common Core Standards in 2014, salaries not broken down between restricted and unrestricted funding sources,” among others. Each area listed by the editor was an area included in the Charter Petition that is of critical concern under the law. As presented in the original petition many of these areas required improvement and without correction would have rendered the petition deficient. If the District was looking for reasons to deny the petition, the District could easily have stated its concerns and then recommended that the petition be denied. However, the District described each deficiency in sufficient detail that the petitioners were able to make the needed corrections and improve the petition such that it was ultimately approved by the Board.
The review of the Charter Petition submitted by Navigator Schools to the Hollister School District was thorough and complete, and the result is clear documentation of the operating procedures for the Hollister Prep School. Hollister Prep School will become an important educational alternative available to students within the Hollister School District. The District looks forward to the contributions to student learning Hollister Prep School will offer students in Hollister.
Gary McIntire is superintendent of HSD.
