Violations of federal law push state to monitor Gwinnett Schools charter lottery

“Public schools have to provide those services,” said Louis Erste, state charter school division director. “ That is why you can’t put that on your forms. You would be breaking the law if you used the information to exclude the students.”

Today, as GSMST holds a lottery to eliminate half of the school's 611 applicants, the state will be monitoring the process for fairness and legal compliance. The high school, which offers extended days, laptops and intense workloads of honors and advanced placement classes, has an enrollment of 613 students.

Dozens of other metro Atlanta charter schools will hold similar drawings as lottery season begins in Georgia. The state has more than 62,300 charter school students. Erste said he is unaware of any other schools having enrollment problems.

Erste said he has no evidence Gwinnett intended to screen students. But in a document obtained through open records, the AJC found associate state superintendent Garry McGiboney admonished GSMST in late January for its application: “Our initial review indicates your current application does not comply with state or federal law or ... your charter contract."

The letter also told the school to nix the prerequisites. The state wrote a similar letter in 2007 when it welcomed its first class.

Gwinnett Schools spokesperson Sloan Roach said the errors were a "mistake" and that the data is not used to screen students. The application has since been corrected. "The intent behind this school from the beginning was to serve all students," she said.

Tony Roberts, CEO of the Georgia Charter Schools Association, is not so certain. He visited the campus a few years ago when it was under its inaugural administration. Roberts said he was asked for advice on weeding out applicants who couldn't handle the rigor.

“At one point we were asked as an association how they could screen their students,” Roberts said. “We informed them as a charter school you can’t screen them. They would have to take someone even as dumb as I am in science and math if I was in their attendance zone.”

Roach said she was, "unaware" of the conversation.

GSMST has a much smaller population of students with disabilities than the 10.4 percent district average. Six students of the school's more than 600 students receive special services. Four are English language learners, less than 1 percent of students. The district average is 7.5 percent.

Parent Jennifer Falk , a former state NAACP education chair, alerted state and local education officials about the possibility GSMST is screening students after searching for registration information for a neighbor.

“It angers me,” Falk said. “I definitely think it caused barriers for families.”

Charter school officials also complained.

Ivy Preparatory Academy's head of school Nina Gilbert wrote the state worried that one of her students who was gifted in math, but had a reading learning disability could be excluded: "Though she would like to, she can not attend this charter school because according to their documents, she does not meet the criteria."

"When did it become acceptable for a Georgia-approved public charter school to require previous year’s achievement results, teacher recommendation and grades before applying?”

GSMST's latest application was posted online about a week before its new Feb. 4. deadline.  "We made some changes to streamline the registration packet. Originally, it was five or six pages long. We streamlined it to a two-page version,” it said.

It did not mention the legally suspect questions the previous application asked, nor did it ask for test scores.

Civil rights attorney Leslie Lipson said more should have been done to invite the disenfranchised back to the process before the lottery. “A correction or an apology should be given saying to parents of children with disabilities that if you read this, we were in error,” she said. “I am really worried that other charter schools are unaware of the obligations that come along with the funding especially since the same school had problems twice.”

Cyndie Hardie, who has two GSMST students, said asking for academic information up front helps administrators to staff the school later. "I don't see the discrimination there," she said. "If your child is struggling in math, and they are at a math school, they are going to have a harder time. It is really the parent that needs to soul search."

Her son, Brian Hardie, a junior, appreciates the care taken with enrollment. He can have intellectual chats with peers.  He's taking Chinese and he is challenged academically. “I am surrounded by kids who are at the same level as me," he said.

More than 300 students have withdrawn including those who couldn't handle the rigor.

Cherkeia Ryan said her sister never got a chance to apply. Last fall, when Ryan stopped by the school to discuss enrolling, she said an office worker told her the teen "was already behind,” Ryan said. “The classes that they are taking at that school are college level classes.”

Ryan said she was told her sixth-grade brother might be eligible. “She told me to go onto the website and see what my brother needs to take to be enrolled in the school.’’

State Department of Education staff attorney Morgan Felts said continued infractions could cause GSMST to risk federal funding.  The school's application violated the No Child Left Behind Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. "Those are really big laws," she said.

Growing interest, enrollment

Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology began four years ago with 192 students and grew its enrollment to roughly 600. Each year, the school has drawn hundreds of applicants.

School year, Number of applicants, Total enrollment

| 2007-2008 | 207 | 192 |

| 2008-200 9| 500+ | 327 |

| 2009-2010 | 272 | 404 |

2010-2011 | 468 | 596 |

|Number of students who withdrew from school due to academic or other reasons

2007-2008: 55

2008-2009: 109

2009-2010: 74

2010-2011: 67