Report: U.S. government wasted up to $1 billion on charter schools [View all]
https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/03/25/report-us-government-wasted-up-billion-charter-schools-still-fails-adequately-monitor-grants/?utm_term=.bec06dfa8faf
The U.S. government has wasted up to $1 billion on charter schools that never opened, or opened and then closed because of mismanagement and other reasons, according to a report from an education advocacy group. The study also says the U.S. Education Department does not adequately monitor how its grant money is spent.
The report, titled
Asleep at the Wheel and issued by the nonprofit advocacy group Network for Public Education, says:
More than 1,000 grants were given to schools that never opened, or later closed because of mismanagement, poor performance, lack of enrollment or fraud. Of the schools awarded grants directly from the department
between 2009 and 2016, nearly one in four either never opened or shut its doors, it says.
Some grants in the 25-year-old federal Charter School Program (CSP) have been awarded to charters that set barriers to enrollment of certain students.
Thirty-four California charter schools that received grants appear on an American Civil Liberties Union list of charters that discriminate in some cases illegally in admissions.