Online charter school fight becomes political football

Associated Press

COLUMBUS

Ohio’s multimillion-dollar legal dispute with one of the nation’s largest online charter schools is seeping into the state’s top political races as the matter moves toward a showdown in court and fuels broader discussions about financial and academic accountability.

The Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, or ECOT as it’s commonly known, has become a political football, with Democrats accusing Republicans of accepting contributions from ECOT affiliates and not holding the poor-performing e-school and other charters to higher standards with better oversight. On the GOP side, the state auditor campaigning to become attorney general has become a vocal advocate for recouping state overpayments to ECOT and other schools.

Raising the issue early in the race could help lesser-known Democrats get attention and connect to their base as they’re fundraising, University of Dayton political scientist Dan Birdsong said. Education tends to be important to voters. But whether ECOT stays in the campaign conversation into 2018 depends on multiple factors, including how ECOT’s case unfolds and whether candidates cast it as an individual case or in broader debate about school choice or accountability, Birdsong said.