Two Fulton County charter schools founded by the educational entrepreneur under investigation in connection with the theft of more than half a million dollars from another charter school say they have cut ties with him.
But officials with the two schools — Latin Grammar and Latin College Preparatory schools, which opened this school year — have refused to answer questions about their schools’ financial relationships with the founder or provide information about whether money may be missing from their schools.
Latin Grammar board chair Eric Banister declined to speak with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Banister and school staff declined to provide the name of Latin College Preparatory’s board chair. Banister said in a written statement on behalf of both schools, they had “severed the relationship” with founder Chris Clemons and his Latin Schools Foundation.
Charter schools are funded with tax dollars but privately operated. They have freedom from many of the rules that apply to traditional public schools, but state law says their records and board meetings must be open so taxpayers can see how public money is spent.
Both the Fulton schools had planned to pay Clemons’ Latin Schools Foundation up to 8 percent of their state revenue, according to their charter applications. In return, the foundation would raise funds, recruit teachers, consult on curriculum and provide other services. Neither school has responded to public records requests sent earlier this week for the current members of their governing boards or for detailed financial information.
In a written statement, Banister said the foundation had helped the Fulton County charter schools “with planning activities.” But the schools “declined to enter into any contracts” with Clemons’ foundation.
Fulton County schools spokeswoman Susan Hale said last week that the school district has “no reason to suspect any mismanagement” at the charter schools.
This summer, Atlanta police began investigating the alleged theft of about $600,000 bank and credit card accounts at Latin Academy, a separate charter school founded by Clemons and authorized by Atlanta Public Schools. Clemons and the school's operations director were the only staff members with access to both accounts, school officials said.
Clemons has not responded to phone messages from the AJC.
Clemons, a magna cum laude Ivy League graduate with an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, founded three Atlanta-area charter schools: Latin Academy, in the Atlanta school district, and Latin Grammar and Latin College Preparatory in Fulton County. The schools focus on teaching the classics, including Latin, to students from low-income families. They were supposed to be the first of a network of similar schools.
The Fulton County schools’ charter applications list nearly identical boards, with many members having ties to the education group Teach for America, a national program that recruits and trains people without education degrees to teach in high-needs schools. Board members named in the applications did not return calls from the AJC this week.
The applications also claim a former top state education official — Eric Wearne, former deputy director of the Governor’s Office of Student Achievement and current professor at Georgia Gwinnett College — as a key leader of Clemons’ foundation. Wearne, who is a board member at the Atlanta charter school, told the AJC that was untrue.
“I’ve never had any role with that foundation,” he wrote in an email.
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