“Chartered”: Jefferson County and the obliteration of local rule
“‘It’s totally obliterated local rule: How a troubled, segregated district lost its public schools”
On 8/27/19, Jessica Bakeman and her colleagues at WLRN published “Chartered” a special investigative report looking closely at Jefferson County, Florida’s first all-charter school district. It is worth your time to take a closer look.
“Florida’s first all-charter school district was engineered by unelected state bureaucrats at then-Gov. Rick Scott’s Department of Education, funded by the state Legislature and carried out by a charter school network based in South Florida, nearly 500 miles away.”
The hour long radio program is well worth a listen. Also, don’t miss the associated documents and interactive graphics at chartered.wlrn.org.
Read about Jefferson County’s troubled past and their elected officials’ attempts to retain local control of their public schools (here and here)
Learn how lawmakers, after blasting Jefferson’s traditional public schools for spending too much money, have increased funding to Jefferson’s charter schools, which now receive over $18,000/student.
Read about how “South Florida legislators who earn six-figure salaries in the charter school industry played a key role in the unprecedented private takeover of a long-struggling public school district, flaunting apparent conflicts of interest.” The article details how legislators like current State Senate Education Chair Manny Diaz, Jr. and current Deputy Majority Leader, Senator Anitere Flores, both are employed by subsidiaries of Academica, the for-profit parent company that oversees Somerset schools, including those in Jefferson. Diaz’ current boss, Doral College President Doug Rodriguez lead the transition to the all-charter school district in Jefferson. When Rodriquez testified on behalf of Somerset Jefferson before House education committees, he was questioned by then Representative Manny Diaz, who denies that interviewing his boss during a legislative session is improper.
Use the interactive graphics to see the connections between the individuals and institutions that made the Jefferson County charter district happen.
Learn how, in 2017, then Rep. Diaz championed HB7069, containing House Speaker Corcoran’s Schools of Hope program, which offered millions of dollars to corporate charter chains willing to establish charter schools in Florida’s most struggling neighborhoods.
Somerset Schools at Jefferson became the state’s first “Schools of Hope,” receiving $2.25 MILLION dollars of Schools of Hope Funding. How? Because Diaz’ bill allowed charter school operators chosen by a district to take over their schools (like Somerset was “chosen” by Jefferson) to qualify as a Schools of Hope operator (f.s. 1002.333(2)(d)). (We wrote about this in 2018)
Listen to at about 54:00 where Senators Diaz suggests he was unaware his Schools of Hope law would ultimately benefit Somerset and Academica.
Bakeman: “Were you aware of the fact that Somerset would apply for or ultimately receive Schools of Hope funding?
Diaz: Uh… No.
Right… raise your hand if you believe that…
Thank you to WLRN and Jessica Bakeman for reporting on the takeover of Jefferson public schools.
Whose district is next?
At the June State Board of Education meeting, “Florida’s appointed State Board of Education cheered on their appointed Commissioner of Education, Richard Corcoran, when he suggested they ask the legislature for emergency powers allowing the state to override Duval County’s duly elected school board and “literally take over the district.” Why? Because when given three options to address student needs at struggling schools, Duval County didn’t pick the option Mr. Corcoran wanted them to… which was to turn their public schools over to an out-of-state, corporate charter chain, specifically to IDEA Academy, a recently identified Schools of Hope Operator.”
Is this Jefferson Round Two? A struggling school, a new hope operator, threatened state takeover? For the record, Duval County Public Schools, a “B” district with nearly identical demographics to Jefferson, receive $8,059/student (below the state average of $8,249, and WELL below Jefferson’s $18,525).
We feel this is important enough to repeat ourselves: