GOP lawmakers could not ignore ailing state charters

With the federal govern- ment breathing down the back of the controversy- ridden, troubled charter school system in Ohio, the Republican-controlled General Assembly last week passed a bill imposing accountability and reporting requirements.

But whether this awakening by the GOP – after years of refusing to clamp down on an industry that has become an article of faith for the party – will impress the U.S. Department of Education remains to be seen.

The federal government awarded a $71 million grant to the Ohio Department of Education for charter schools. The award represents the largest single share of the national pot, according to the Associated Press in Columbus.

The wire service also reported that politicians of both parties had questioned Ohio’s ability to responsibly oversee implementation of the grant in the current climate. The U.S. Department of Education said it had placed conditions on the money as a result of happenings in the state. Federal officials are scheduled to be in Ohio this week to discuss the award.

“The test of how well those dollars are used may be the first challenge this legislation faces in its actual real-world application,” said Sen. Frank Sawyer, a co-sponsor of Senate portions of the charter-overhaul bill.

Last week, Congressman Tim Ryan of Howland, D-13th, a member of the appropriations committee, sent a letter to Education Secretary Arne Duncan seeking a copy of the original grant application submitted by the state.

Ryan also asked the federal education department to place “stringent restrictions on the disbursement” of the money. The congressman said he had “strong reservations” about the oversight procedures of the charter-school program and how the state will use the $71 million.

To back up his concerns, Ryan correctly pointed out that a top state education department official had resigned after he was found to have acted improperly.

Egregious actions

David Hansen stepped down as the state’s Education School Choice director when it was revealed that he had mishandled evaluations of charter-school sponsors. In fact, Hansen’s actions were more egregious. He admitted that he excluded F grades from evaluations of charter-school sponsors of online and dropout-recovery schools.

That revelation simply confirms what many Ohioans have long suspected: The Republican Party is so closely aligned with the charter-school industry that it has not been interested in applying the same rules, regulations and stringent standards that govern the public school system.

But the GOP has been hard-pressed to pretend that everything is going well with the charters when one controversy after another, and one failing school after another, have made the truth impossible to hide.

With regard to the Hansen matter, we have called for an independent investigation to determine if the former education department official had acted alone, or if he was following orders from higher-ups. We’re still waiting for such a probe to be launched. Tens of thousands of pages of documents related to the Hansen flap have been turned over to the state auditor and inspector general.

Republican Gov. John Kasich, who has voiced concern about the failing charter schools, will sign the legislation because it gives the state new enforcement tools to hold the schools accountable and to crack down on bad actors.

Reports of attendance irregularities, fiscal mismanagement and staff improprieties at some charter schools have soured many Ohioans to the experiment that was launched 18 years ago in the face of failing public schools.

But recent studies found that students at Ohio charter schools were lagging behind their public school counterparts, even as charters in other parts of the country have thrived.

The bill is intended to make it easier for high-performing charters to expand, while labeling the worst ones “poor,” and it will forbid “sponsor-hopping” by under-performing charter operators, among other changes.

While we are pleased that Republican lawmakers have finally seen the light, we believe this should be the first step in the overhaul of the charter school industry in Ohio, an industry that has become a national joke.