Unregulated charter school finances wasting taxpayer money with rampant fraud.

[madfloridian]

One of my objections to charter schools is that they get public taxpayer money, but they do not have to undergo close scrutiny like public schools do.

Another objection is that they make claims to be private when it suits their purpose, like preventing unions from forming. They make claims to be public when they need that extra financing.

All the thousands that go with the student to charter schools are no longer available for the public schools.

These are just the Pennsylvania charter schools with fraudulent finances, there are many from other states as well once investigations are started.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/06/online-charter-school_n_1654955.html">Frontier Virtual High School In Pennsylvania Shuts Down After Failed Years

The online charter school Frontier Virtual Charter High School promised students internship opportunities and language learning when it opened last year.

Yet after the charter school failed this past year to provide students with basic learning tools like computers and Internet, the Pennsylvania Department of Education filed court documents to revoke the charter, Education Week reports. Students were also regularly truant or failing.

.."One Department document read: "Frontier incurred significant expenses and debt that were unrelated to the delivery of services to students of a cyber charter school, including purchases at restaurants, cash withdrawals that were not substantiated with receipts... and local transportation token purchases."

..."During a March investigation into whether the charter school was living up to standards, education department staff were repeatedly denied access to school records and were not permitted to interview school staff, according to a press release on the department website."

There's more:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/24/dorothy-june-hairston-bro_n_1699765.html

Philadelphia Charter School Mogul, Charged With Defrauding $6.5 Million In Tax Dollars

Philadelphia charter school mogul Dorothy June Hairston Brown was charged Tuesday -- along with four colleagues -- with defrauding three charter schools of more than $6.5 million in tax dollars.

Brown and her executives were indicted on 62 counts of wire fraud, obstruction of justice and witness tampering. She had earned praise for student test scores and had a reputation for claiming large salaries and filing suits against parents who questioned her, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
Brown founded three Philadelphia charter schools: the Laboratory, Ad Prima and Planet Abacus. She also had a hand in creating the Agora Cyber Charter School, which offers online lessons to students across the state. Brown was reportedly paid $150,000 for working 30 hours weekly at Laboratory and $115,904 for a single week at Ad Prima.

"Charter schools are funded with public money that is intended to help educate children in our communities," Special Agent in Charge George C. Venizelos of the Philadelphia Division of the FBI said in a statement. "When individuals misappropriate those funds, as this indictment today alleges, they trade our children's education and our children's future for their own illegal profit."

And another:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/13/fbi-agents-raid-office-of_n_1671829.html">Nick Trombetta, Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School Founder, Has Office Raided By FBI Agents

FBI agents on Thursday raided the office of Pennsylvania Charter Cyber School founder Nick Trombetta, who is suspected of misusing Pennsylvania tax dollars to fund his out-of-state ventures, KDKA News reports.

The FBI raided the administrative offices of PA Cyber and other ventures founded by Trombetta, including the Avanti Management Group -- a for-profit consultant firm based in Ohio.

The Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, founded in 2000, enrolled more than 11,300 students in the 2011-12 academic year and has an annual budget of more than $100 million. Critics say the $10,000 the school receives for each child far exceeds the cost of educating a student online, and that the excess money has gone to other Trombetta ventures such as the National Network of Digital Schools and the Lincoln Interactive, which develops and markets online curriculum.

These ventures have spawned cyber schools nationwide, and a federal investigation is now underway to determine if Trombetta personally profited.

Let's not leave Florida out of the picture. Several Imagine Charter Schools are being threatened with closing for huge taxpayer debt and very poor grades.

And in July another Florida charter school was shut down, leaving the parents in confusion. Many of them sounded angry during interviews on the news tonight. I don't blame them. There's been a lot of manipulation and lying going on.

http://www.abcactionnews.com/dpp/news/region_hillsborough/at-jones-academy-officially-closed-letter-emailed-to-parents-faculty">A.T. Jones Academy officially closed; letter emailed to parents, faculty

CARROLLWOOD - Dozens of teachers and hundreds of families learned Wednesday afternoon they must find new jobs and a new school for their children to attend because A.T. Jones Academy does not have the finances to open its doors this year.

"I want to stay with my friends," sobbed Delana Kruining, 8, who attended the charter school along with her sister Katie, 6.

Hillsborough County Schools sent trucks to the academy to pick up items purchased with taxpayer money.

.."Parents asked where all the school's money went only to be told all their questions would be addressed in an email sent out Monday. No email was ever sent.

Just find myself wondering where these kids would go if public schools keep losing funds to charters and vouchers. We often got students back from those schools which can cherry-pick. We had the job then of building back up some very bruised egos and helping kids get back their self-confidence. They came back to us feeling like failures.

They were not failures, the charter schools were failing them.

Crossposted at DU3

[Enthusiast]

1. You hit on the reason for this push to privatize schools,

and everything else. The reason is a lack of public scrutiny. Just as Halliburton and KBR fleeced the tax payer in Iraq, these charter school "wizards" are coming for a piece of the public largess. They are criminals, just common criminals, pure and simple.

[No Elephants]

2. Everything you've posted on this points to a massive rip off of the taxpayer

for private profit, to the detriment of our kids.

[madfloridian]

3. It IS a massive rip off of taxpayers.

For private profit.

[formercia]

4. Who could have guessed?

Who could have predicted?
Who would have had a clue?
The signs were there
but nobody listened
but the choir

The Gods of Silence
took away the words
where nobody could hear
They Laughed