The former superintendent behind a rejected charter school proposal for Northwest Arkansas is visionary, the vice chairman of the State Board of Education said Tuesday.
“He really has cutting-edge ideas,” said Brenda Gullett. “He just was not able to develop the plan to our satisfaction.”
The State Board of Education on Monday unanimously denied an application by retired veteran superintendent Frank Holman to open a charter school that would create a largely online, project-based learning environment designed to reachteenagers who have dropped out or are considering dropping out of school.
The school, proposed for up to 500 students in eighththrough 12th grades, would have drawn students primarily from Northwest Arkansas, but would have been open to students from across the state. The school’s home base would have been in Lincoln.
Board members said Monday they could not approve the proposed open-enrollment charter school because Holman’s presentation didn’t exactly reflect what was written in the application. Several board members said they anticipate a more fully formedcharter application in the future.
“It’s very disappointing,” Holman said. “It wasn’t unexpected.”
Holman first presented his proposal to the state board in November. Eight board members seemed to like his proposal but tabled their decision and asked him to come back after answering some questions from the department, Holman said. Holman said he thought he had all the questions answered, including questionsrelated to the budget and to obtaining agreements from school districts that would serve as testing centers for the charter school students.
Holman, who retired last summer as superintendent of the Lincoln Consolidated School District, said his interest in the charter school developed out of a concern for the more than 11,000 students statewide who drop out of school annually and because20 percent of the state’s dropouts are in Benton and Washington counties.
“This is a very innovative school,” Holman said. “We went with the idea that we can save some of these students.”
Gullett said the proposal intrigued her because of Holman’s plans for his school to be part of the New Tech Network, a national network of schools that features project-based learning and technology. She liked the idea of courses delivered virtually or mixing virtual learning with learning in a classroom. The school would have provided an option for students across the state.
The state board has approved conversion charters for school districts to launch New Tech high schools, including three district conversion charter high schools approved Monday for Rogers, Blytheville and Murfreesboro. School districts operate conversion charter schools.
The approval of three New Tech Network charter schools raises to 15 the number of Arkansas schools that will be tied to that network next year, although not all are charter schools. Nationwide, there are 115 New Tech schools in 18 states this year.
When he was still superintendent, Holman won approval in January 2012 from the state board to convert Lincoln High School into a district-run New Tech high school.
The New Tech Network, which started in Napa, Calif., in 1996, provides support and resources to each school, in part with an online learning-management system.
Holman’s proposal this year for an open-enrollment charter left too many unanswered questions, however, Gullett said. The board remained unclear about what the school would be like.
“He wanted us to go ahead and approve him on good faith,” Gullett said. “We had no assurance.”
Charter applications are approved for a minimum of five years and closing a charter school is difficult because it affects families and nearbyschool districts, she said.
The state board is eager for Arkansas to develop a plan for providing virtual learning, Gullett said.
Holman has described the charter school as offering a “blended virtual” model. Students would receive most of their instruction online while at home or traveling, but they would be under the daily supervision of a teacher through videoconference technology.
Arkansas Virtual Academy, a charter school, offers the only option in the state for children in kindergarten through eighth grade to attend classes online. The school has an enrollment of 499 students for the 2012-13, according to Arkansas Department of Education records, and the school’s enrollment is capped at 500.
The state does not have a public online high school as an option for ninth- through 12th-graders, said Sarah Burke, a research assistant in the Office of Education Policy at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.
Developing the proposal for America’s Charter School took eight months, Holman said. He remains concerned about teenagers who leave school and is keeping his options open for helping them. That could mean submitting another proposal to the state board or finding a different avenue.
“There’s a definite need,” he said. “I’m going to definitely see what I can do to move this agenda forward.”
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 01/16/2013