Prestige Academy, Freire, DE Design Lab, and Academy of Dover All Getting Formal Review

On the agenda for the Delaware State Board of Education meeting on Thursday, April 16th, it states under the charter section “Formal Review of a Charter School”.  I was curious which one it was and opened up the tab, and found that four charters are going to be put on formal review.

Details
The Department of Education will request the Assent of the State Board of Education to place the following charter schools on formal review (Specific Information will be provided by the DOE by 4/14) Academy of Dover Delaware Design Lab High School Freire Charter School  Prestige Academy The Department of Education will request to remove Academia Antonia Alonso from probationary status

Academy of Dover, Delaware Design Lab, Freire and Prestige Academy are all getting this designation on Thursday.  I imagine DE Design Lab and Freire will go under review for enrollment.  I’m guessing they are not at 80%.  As for Academy of Dover and Prestige Academy, I have some guesses.  Academy of Dover had some financial problems last fall when Head of School Noel Rodriguez “resigned”.  The DOE still does not have the financial part of the school’s performance framework on their website, over six months later.  Prestige Academy had their December board meeting at a restaurant/tavern and their website is a mess.  It would seem very late in the year for these schools to go under formal review for academics.  Anyone out there know anything specific?

The Delaware DOE website has no mention of this, probably because the State Board of Education meeting would be the official announcement, but their notes do say information will be forthcoming tomorrow.

Potential Priority School List Was Actually Potential DE Talent Cooperative Schools

A month and a half ago, I posted an email between employees of the Delaware DOE concerning a list of schools.  There was no reference to what this list was for, but it was somewhat suspicious given the priority schools fiasco in Red Clay and Christina.  Upon reviewing more from a huge FOIA drop, I have found another email concerning that list, and this does verify the list was for the Delaware Talent Cooperative.  Just thought I would get this out there in case anyone was concerned about this.  I have heard, however, there will be new “focus” schools named later this year….

School Eligibility

Eligible schools are schools that serve high populations of traditionally underserved students. Specifically, a school is eligible if it meets at least one of these four conditions: