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Following, you will find a variety of articles and links regarding our charter petition. Our charter and supporting documents are also attached at the bottom of the page. Charter school backers strike back, ask questions http://www.almanacnews.com/story.php?story_id=7307
There are piles of letters calling Pat Gemma's guest editorial on why the Sequoia high school district opposes Everest's charter petition "propaganda," "misleading," and even a "big lie." I call it a learning experience. Within hours of the superintendent's declaration in last week's Almanac saying that the rigors of college preparation would pose "insurmountable challenges" for special education, second language, and poor students, an incensed mass of teenagers struck back. They weren't hurling insults, tagging the walls of the district office or personally attacking their detractor. They grabbed video cameras and captured "The truth about Summit and Everest" in a respectful, articulate, and honest film posted on YouTube. Next they turned to Facebook, where they created a group, encouraged a few hundred people to join, and began a fact-filled analysis of the merits, or lack thereof, of the district's perspective. Finally, they delivered to the county Board of Education thoughtful, impassioned pleas for the approval of Everest in the name of choice and opportunity for all students. Who would expect a group of high school kids to: a) care what the superintendent said about their school in the local paper; b) feel empowered to do something about it, and c) possess the skills and knowledge to systematically debunk the false and offensive statements he made? Everyone at Summit Prep and Everest would because high expectations for character and scholarship are the fabric of this community. As public high school educators we believe that every student should have a sincere opportunity to graduate from a four-year college. We believe it is our job to prepare all students without exception or excuse, necessitating a departure from the traditional educational approach of the previous 100 years. To that end, we have designed and built a school model which supports our unrelenting commitment to achieving the goal of 100 percent college preparation regardless of background. And it works! Teenagers don't want to fail, drop out, and end up in dead-end jobs. Teenagers do want to be smart, do well, be acknowledged, make an impact, and succeed in life. Summit Prep is the inspiring example of what happens when a school and all the people in it assume college is possible for everyone. In many ways the outcome of the county board's vote on Monday night (after the Almanac's deadline) is irrelevant because the destiny of Everest public high school does not rest in the hands of elected officials or school employees. It lives in the kids. The students are consumed with preparation for final exams, but physics and statistics aren't the only things they are learning. It is common to find groups of students huddled around computers displaying graduation rates and school finance data. And with their research comes a never-ending stream of questions. If the school district receives $9,423 to educate me each year, but gives Summit Prep only $6,800, how are they losing money? How can the superintendent say that 96 percent of the district's students attend college when, according to the California Department of Education's Web site, only 36 percent of the district's ninth-graders graduate four years later are qualified to apply? Why would anyone in our community want to deny other students the same opportunity we have? Shouldn't we all be asking such questions? Diane Tavenner is the founder of Summit Preparatory Charter High School and the lead petitioner for Everest Public High School. Click here for facts and data that rebutt the SUHSD Superintendent's false statements On September 17, the Sequoia Union High School District (SUHSD) voted 4-1 to deny the Everest Public High School Charter.The Petitioners of Everest Public High School would like to thank the members of the community who attended the hearing. You were eloquent, intelligent, and passionate speakers.
On September 15, SUHSD released a seventeen page report recommending that the District Trustees deny the Everest Public High School (EPHS) charter petition. The report fails to comply with charter school law, is factually inaccurate and attacks Summit Preparatory Charter High School, the highly regarded and successful school upon which Everest is modeled. We believe that the public record needs to be corrected. To do so, we created a point-by-point response to the Response and Recommended Findings of Fact Regarding the Everest Charter School Petition. It is attached to this web page.
Concerns Raised by Speakers at the August 13th Everest Charter Petition Hearing and Responses by Everest Petitioners 1. Another charter school will take away resources from existing programs It is understandable that the public perception is that charter schools will take away from district schools and programs, as this has been the most common and widely used argument against charter schools since their inception over fifteen years ago, and because school financing is extremely complicated. We have had success explaining why a charter school will not take away from a district school or program with the following basic explanation: In general in California, the basic K-12 funding philosophy is that the state allocates a fixed dollar amount to educate each public school child each year. The dollar amount is allocated on an individual student basis, and therefore, wherever the child attends a public school in the state, the money follows that child to educate him/her. Additionally, the child is only funded for the days he/she attends school and therefore the amount is reduced for every absence. Therefore, in the case of Everest, the fixed dollar amount or Average Daily Attendance (ADA) ($6,767 for 2007-2008) to educate every child who attends this charter school will go to the school as opposed to the district where they would have otherwise attended. What is important to note is that while the money follows the students, so does the responsibility to educate the student. Thus, the charter school now bears all financial responsibility for the education of that child and the district no longer has that responsibility. Now many will argue that the amount allocated by the state is not enough to educate a child, and certainly that may be the case, but at this point in time the reality for California public schools is that they must educate each child for the amount allocated by the state. There are some special factors in the specific case of Everest and the Sequoia Union High School District that perhaps cause confusion. Specifically, because the majority of the state money that funds K-12 education is generated by property tax revenue, there are a small number of school districts in the state that collect property tax dollars in excess of the total ADA for all of their students. In these cases, the districts are permitted to retain the excess money, and therefore have more money to spend per student than the state’s fixed rate. The Sequoia Union High School District (SUHSD) is such a district, as are many of the local districts. Specifically, SUHSD in 2007 had an ADA or fixed per pupil amount of $9,629 (see attachment). The great news for community members with this concern is that the district is only required to pass on the fixed rate per student to Everest, thereby allowing them to retain the $2,862 ($1,107,663) difference to enhance the district budget. Another special factor in this particular case is that if students who do not live within the SUHSD boundaries attend Everest, as is permitted by charter law, the district as sponsor would be required to provide funding for those students to the charter school even though the district is not receiving funding for those students, except by reimbursement from the child’s home district. Unfortunately, as we have seen with Summit Prep, the reimbursement is not 100%, but rather 70% and/or is not guaranteed by other school districts with the same funding status as SUHSD, which includes several of the surrounding districts. This is disappointing, but the good news is that in 2007-2008, Summit Prep had approximately 50 out of district students for which the district has not yet been reimbursed or only received 70% reimbursement. Therefore, the district had to pass along to Summit Prep approximately $150,000 for which it did not receive funding. Fortunately, the $1,107,663 retained by the district is offsetting and the result is a net gain of $957,663 for the district. 2. SUHSD is already college prep The SUHSD is absolutely preparing students for college at each of its four comprehensive high schools. In 2006-2007, according to the California Department of Education, 51.5% of the Sequoia High School District graduates had completed all the courses required for University of California (UC) and/or California State University (CSU) entrance with a grade of "C" or better. In fact district schools have a long history of preparing students to attend some of the best colleges in the country. However, even with these impressive statistics, there are still 48.5% of the graduates who are not eligible for four year college admission upon graduation. More specifically 71.3% of the district’s Hispanic graduates are not eligible for UC or CSU admission upon graduation. Summit Prep offers a different approach to preparing students for college than those offered by district schools. This is not to say that one is better or worse, but rather they are different, just as people and learners are different. Summit Prep’s approach is also working as evidenced by the fact that in the first two graduating classes, 100% of the students had completed all courses required for UC and CSU entrance and 96% of them were accepted to at least one four year university. For Summit’s Hispanic students which represent 34% of the graduates, the college preparation and acceptance rate is 100%. Everest seeks to replicate Summit Prep’s successful college preparatory model to provide additional opportunity for even more students to be prepared for four year college. 3. Charter school facility requirements take away from district needs School facilities cost money. And while many students across California attend school in old, dilapidated, and often unsafe buildings, the students of the Sequoia Union High School District are extremely fortunate to have fantastic state of the art facilities. Certainly this is the case because the school district has gone to extraordinary efforts to raise $323 million dollars in bond money over the last seven years and the community has been extremely generous in supporting the public schools. Like pupil funding in California, the philosophy is that all public school children will share equally in the school facilities, including those attending public charter schools. Proposition 39, solidified this view and sought to increase the dollars for school facility funding by lowering the percentage of votes required to pass a school bond measure from two-thirds to 55% with the understanding the some of the funding must be set aside to provide charter school facilities. Summit Prep has demonstrated its commitment to working collaboratively with the district to find creative and cost effective solutions for equitably distributing school facilities and dollars to all of the public school children of the district. During the first three years of operation Summit Prep raised outside donations and funds to finance its facility and all furnishings and for all six years of operation the school has rented space for physical education and athletics to minimize the use of the district facilities. Currently Summit Prep is located in a beautiful district facility at 890 Broadway. Per our Facilities Use Agreement, the school is annually paying $94,000 (2.7%of its operating budget) to occupy the facility and is collecting donations to make capital improvements to the building. To date the school has already installed all of the required indoor and outdoor signage for a public building, and is currently working on creating an outdoor space and reconfiguring the parking and traffic plan to decrease traffic congestion in the surrounding neighborhood. 4. Summit Prep and Everest are elitist and taking from the many to serve the few In 1999, the original group of parents who launched discussions that ultimately lead to the creation of Summit Prep were primarily from the communities of Woodside and Portola Valley. During those early conversations before a charter school was even contemplated, and when people were getting together and brainstorming, there were ideas thrown out about starting a high school that would be small and serve only those two communities. We believe this is the origin of a perception of elitism that has persisted for all of these years. As is often the case, reality does not match perception, and in fact the concept that prevailed from those early discussions is what Summit Prep has become and what Everest seeks to be. The people who ultimately founded the school have always desired and ultimately created a school that is richly diverse in terms of the ethnicity, race, socio-economic status, family background, gender, language, learning style, interest and in all other conceivable ways. It is simultaneously committed to equity and excellence, which is why the school is untracked and expects all of its students to achieve to their maximum potential. Summit and Everest supporters do not believe that goals for college success are exclusive to highly educated families living in affluent communities, rather we believe this to be a relatively universal desire for the families of this community and thus the schools’ guarantees of preparing all students for college (regardless of prior preparation or previous academic performance) represent a commitment to equity and not elitism. In this regard, the Summit Prep 2008-2009 student demographic reflect the stated mission. In 2008-2009, 44.7% of Summit’s students are economically disadvantaged and 29% meet the federal guidelines for free and reduced lunch. Statistics from the California Department of Education indicated that in 2007-08 37% of the district’s students are economically disadvantaged.
Source for District Enrollment: California Department of Education DataQuest Certainly the small size and waiting list may lead some to believe that the school is exclusive because not all students are admitted. This is of course the primary reason that Everest is being proposed, since it is the great desire of everyone involved with Summit Prep to serve every student who wishes to attend. Finally, as the Almanac has recently reported, when at capacity Summit Prep and Everest combined will serve 9% of the district’s student population, but received only 6.5% of the annual budget, indicating that the few will in fact be making more funds available for the many. 5. Charter schools aren’t open to everyone While it is true that charter schools are not required to be “comprehensive” schools and they are allowed to organize around a single focus or mission, charter schools are public schools that are open to all students residing in California. Whereas District schools are only legally required to serve children living within the geographic boundaries of the district, charter schools must accept all students who apply as long as space is available. In a case when there are more applicants than spaces, the charter school is required by law to hold a public random drawing to determine which students are admitted to the school. Charter schools are schools of choice, and so students and parents may choose not to attend them if they don’t believe the focus or mission addresses the needs of the child. However a charter school, like all public schools, is legally required to provide for the educational needs of students with disabilities and second language learners, and charter schools are legally prohibited from counseling students out of the school or denying anyone admission. 6. Charter schools equal private control of public tax dollars with no accountability Charter schools across the country have different governance and accountability structures. In the specific cases of Summit Prep and Everest the following is fact:
In fact, many believe that charter schools are held to a higher level of accountability for two reasons:
7. Special education is not provided at charter schools In 2003, prior to the opening of Summit Prep, the school applied to be a Local Education Agency (LEA) of the San Mateo County Special Education Local Area Plan (SELPA). Summit Prep was a conditional member of the SELPA for two years before becoming a full member in 2005. In 2006 when the law required a change in sponsoring district, the school was required to reapply for membership and was a conditional member for an additional year before being granted full membership in 2007. As both a conditional and full LEA member, Summit Prep has all of the same legal responsibilities and obligations with regards to special education as every other school district (LEA) in the SELPA. During the three years of conditional membership, Summit Prep was closely monitored by the SELPA personnel to ensure that the school’s practices and procedures were in fact legal, compliant and appropriate. Election to full membership was dependent upon the SELPA making this finding, which it did. Practically speaking, because Summit Prep is a school of choice that is focused on college preparation, it is improbable that many families would elect to enroll their children if they are qualified for special education due to mental retardation, deaf-blindness, multiple disability or traumatic brain injury. However, Summit Prep has served or is currently serving students from six of the thirteen disability categories including autism, emotional disturbance and hard of hearing. In fact, 7% of Summit Prep’s students are qualified for special education (the district average is 10%) and have an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). An additional, 8% have diagnosed learning disabilities, but are succeeding using mainstream supports and accommodations.
Summit Prep was sponsored by the Summerville Union High School District for its first three years of operation (2003-2006). During the entirety of the sponsorship, Summerville never indicated either in writing or verbally any concerns with any aspect of Summit Prep. In fact, the relationship was extremely collaborative and supportive with both parties working diligently to communicate and complete all required reports, actions and monitoring functions. Perhaps most notable is that the Summerville District never charged Summit Prep an oversight fee for sponsorship, even though they were legally entitled to do so, and they undoubtedly incurred costs in providing oversight to Summit Prep given the distance they had to travel to visit the school and that all phone and mail communication was long distance. The Sequoia Union High School District has sponsored Summit Prep since June of 2006, for just over two years. During that time, the SUHSD has only once alleged that Summit Prep violated the MOU between the district and school. This occurred in July of 2008 when the Superintendent notified the school in writing that he believed that the Summit Prep had violated provision 39 of the MOU which disallows negative marketing and a provision of the Facility Use Agreement (FUA) which does not allow the school to sublet the facility without district approval. On August 11, 2008, the Superintendent of SUHSD and the Executive Director of Summit Prep met to discuss the alleged violations and concluded in writing that in fact Summit Prep had not violated either the MOU or FUA. Summit Prep takes very seriously its reporting obligations, and works diligently to ensure that all federal, state, county and district reporting requirements are met professionally and in a timely manner. During the past two years, Summit Prep has kept good records of the submission of all required reports and data and maintains that they have been appropriately submitted. To date the district has not indicated that Summit Prep has failed to submit or inadequately submitted required reports or data. It is true that Summit Prep and the District disagree about the transmission of one specific set of data that is not required by federal, state, or charter requirements, but rather requested by the district. Specifically, each summer the District asks Summit Prep to provide a list of the names, addresses, phone numbers and middle schools of all students who have enrolled in the charter school. The District indicates that it intends to cross reference the list with its enrolled students to determine if any of the students are dual enrolled and then to either drop the student’s enrollment from the district or contact the family and demand that they make a decision or be dropped from district enrollment. The District indicates that it needs this information to appropriately staff its schools. Summit Prep has indicated an absolute commitment to helping the district to make informed staffing decisions, but has proposed a different approach that the school feels protects the rights of families to make choices regarding which school their child attends and respects the confidentiality of their personal information. Specifically, Summit Prep:
Additionally, the MOU requires both the school and district to collect, report to one another and discuss the 7th grade STAR data of the entering 9th grade classes. To date, neither the District nor the School have provided this information to the other and the meeting to discuss it has not occurred. |
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