Gwinnett locally approved charter schools
Gwinnett Online Campus in Norcross
Opened: 2011
Serves: grades 6-12 (4-12 beginning in 2013)
Uniqueness: option for students who don't attend a traditional school campus and take classes online, usually from home with extensive teacher interaction and support
2012 enrollment: 179
Performance data: none available yet
Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology in Lawrenceville
Opened: 2007
Serves: grades 9-12
Uniqueness: accelerated curriculum focusing on mathematics, science, engineering and technology, with internships in related research institutions, businesses and industries
2012 enrollment: 851
Performance data: highest SAT scores in the state for 2012: average of 1941
Maxwell High School of Technology in Lawrenceville
Opened: As a conversion charter, 2010
Serves: grades 11-12
Uniqueness: offers technical education programs a half day, students co-enrolled at home school, dual credit and potential industry certification
2012 enrollment: 1,024
Performance data: testing data go back to the students' home schools
New Life Academy of Excellence with locations in Duluth (K-8) and Norcross
(K-3)
Opened: 2007, renewal in 2009 and 2012
Uniqueness: K-8 school with focus on Chinese language and culture
2012 enrollment: 582
Performance data: CRCT 3rd grade reading 2011-2012 — 53 percent met standards and 44 percent exceeds standards. This compared with the districtwide average of 39 percent meeting standards and 55 percent exceeding standards
Source: Gwinnett County Public Schools
Gwinnett, Ivy Prep timeline
May 2007: Ivy Preparatory Academy's founding board petitions Gwinnett County Public Schools to open a campus for girls after submitting a letter of intent in 2006. Nina Gilbert, a former Gwinnett school administrator, leads the charge.
June 2007: Gwinnett County Public Schools rejects Ivy Prep's petition.
January 2008: Ivy Prep appeals to the state Board of Education for approval as a state special school and is approved.
August 2008: Ivy Prep opens with 200 students in Norcross.
June 2009: After operating exclusively on state and federal funds, Ivy Prep appeals to the Georgia Charter Schools Commission and wins approval.
September 2010: Gwinnett County Public Schools files a lawsuit in Fulton County Superior Court challenging the state charter commission's constitutionality and ability to approve charter schools. Six other local districts join the lawsuit. The case pits Gwinnett, Atlanta, DeKalb, Henry, Bulloch, Candler and Griffin public schools against the commission, the state Department of Education, former Georgia Schools Superintendent Kathy Cox and Ivy Prep and others.
May 2010: Fulton Superior Court Judge Wendy L. Shoob rules that the Georgia Charter Schools Commission can approve and fund schools.
October 2010: The Georgia State Supreme Court hears the arguments in the case after seven local school districts appeal.
May 2011: State Supreme Court declares the Georgia Charter Schools Commission unconstitutional.
June 2011: The Gwinnett County school board offers Ivy Prep a one-year charter to keep its doors open, but the school rejects the offer and rescinds its application. Ivy Prep leaders charge that the school board offered significantly less than Gwinnett County Public Schools' per-pupil funding of $7,549.
July 2011: Gwinnett school board approves Ivy Prep for a one-year contract with funding of $4,400 per pupil.
January 2012: Ivy Prep heads back to the state for consideration of its charter application after its renewal application was rejected by the Gwinnett County school board. There were two applications: one for a boys school and one for the girls school. The local board cites the school's financial instability as reason for denial.
May 2012: Ivy Prep is approved as a state charter school again after the State Board of Education approves a two-year contract.
School performance data: On eighth-grade writing test for 2011-2012, 90 percent met standards, 3 percent exceeded standards. This compares with the district average, 76 percent meeting standards and 17 percent exceeding standards.
In the highly contested fight over the charter school amendment, Gwinnett County is ground zero.
Republican Gov. Nathan Deal headlines the amendment’s backers, who are pushing to re-create a state commission with the authority to approve charter schools that have been previously denied by local boards of education.
Opponents, including GOP state School Superintendent John Barge, say that charter school applicants already have an avenue of appeal through the state Board of Education and that the amendment would create a new state bureaucracy that could siphon money away from traditional public schools.
The constitutional amendment, which was narrowly approved by the Republican-controlled Legislature earlier this year, goes before voters Nov. 6 after intense campaigning on both sides.
But nowhere is the amendment debate being more closely watched than in Gwinnett, where one in 10 Georgia public school students are enrolled and where, arguably, the dispute began a few years ago.
Gwinnett school officials filed a lawsuit in 2010 challenging the constitutionality of the Georgia Charter School Commission, an independent body created by lawmakers in 2008 and given the power to approve charter school applications that local school boards had rejected.
The suit, which cost the district $300,000, followed the commission’s approval of an application from Ivy Preparatory Academy in Norcross that the Gwinnett school board had rejected in 2007. The commission also redirected about $1 million annually from the district to the school. The suit included six other school districts that had seen some of their funding redirected to charter schools they had not approved.
Gwinnett and the other districts won the suit in a decision by the Georgia Supreme Court in May 2011, only to see lawmakers come back this year and pass the constitutional amendment.
J. Alvin Wilbanks, the school district’s CEO and superintendent, said he wasn’t surprised by lawmakers’ actions.
“We felt the General Assembly would probably try to come back and do an end-round because they were pretty much bent on doing whatever they wanted to do in terms of allowing charter schools to be created without the approval and consent of the local [school] boards,” he said.
Gwinnett school employees, the school system’s vendors and attorneys were among early donors to Vote Smart Georgia, the major campaign committee working to defeat the amendment.
Wilbanks, who donated $5,000 to Vote Smart, says he has spent much of his “own time” campaigning against the amendment. At this point, the vote is believed to be too close to call.
Last week, Wilbanks debated the merits of the amendment before a small crowd in Henry County. On Sunday, he went toe to toe with House Speaker Pro Tem Jan Jones and other amendment supporters in a televised appearance before the Atlanta Press Club.
Meanwhile, two lawsuits are pending against the school district alleging that educators have crossed the line by campaigning on government time and money, a charge Wilbanks flatly denies.
Bert Brantley, a spokesman for the pro-amendment group Families for Better Public Schools, said Wilbanks, as a face of the opposition, is open to criticism. He collects a $400,000 salary and has a larger than average central office staff, even as teachers are being furloughed, Brantley said.
“And worst of all, his district consistently blocked a high-quality charter application, toyed with the school’s funding after they received state approval, and incorrectly bashes their academic performance publicly in a wrong-headed effort to discredit a successful school that wouldn’t be in existence if he had his way,” Brantley said.
Nina Gilbert, a former Gwinnett school administrator and co-founder of Ivy Prep, says Gwinnett officials denied her charter application without giving her an opportunity to address their concerns.
“The intention all along was not to accept the school as a Gwinnett County school,” Gilbert said.
The school system has approved other charter schools, including the Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology in Lawrenceville, which had the state’s highest average SAT score for a public school in 2012 at 1941.
But Gwinnett school leaders say concerns about Ivy Prep’s financial viability largely led to their decision to deny its application.
Gilbert said the school board placed Ivy Prep’s financial health in jeopardy when, after the Supreme Court ruled, the school’s funding was set at $4,400 per student, from all funds, compared with $7,549 for other traditional schools.
She says her school, which has about 400 students, has been innovative, with expanded school days running from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. and back-to-back math classes.
Wilbanks said he believes the constitutional amendment is the work of state lawmakers who are members of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a group that’s gained national attention for authoring bills such as Arizona’s immigration measure and for promoting legislation similar to Florida’s stand-your-ground law in multiple states.
“It fits within their playbook to privatize, defund and dismantle public education,” Wilbanks said.
He said he believes the push for the amendment also is being directed by outside groups who want a share of the billions of dollars that could be made by creating charter schools and turning them over to private management companies.
Charter Schools USA of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., a major charter school management company that pushed for a charter school in Cherokee County, gave $50,000 to the main group working to pass the amendment.
More than 100 local school boards across the state have passed resolutions opposing the amendment, which supporters expect will spark an increase in charter schools with a new commission appointed largely by pro-charter leaders in the Legislature.
Charter schools are a popular with lawmakers from Washington to Atlanta, despite reports indicating that, as a whole, most perform no better than traditional public schools. One reason for their popularity is that they stress, and in some cases mandate, more parental involvement.
But amendment supporters say leaders in traditional local public schools see them as competition and for that reason often reject charter applications.
Barge, the state school superintendent, has said that if more charters are approved, lawmakers will have to come up with more money. If the new commission approves only seven charters a year — the average approved under the now-defunct Georgia Charter Schools Commission — the extra costs for five years will be about $430 million, he said.
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