Reform Laws Needed
to prevent abuses such as occur at Gulen charter schools
This page gives model legislation for charter schools, based on the careful consideration of loopholes that Gulen charter schools and other charter schools have exploited and abused.
Lobbying organizations such as ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange Council) and the NAPCS (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools) provide state lawmakers with model charter school laws that benefit special interest groups. In contrast, the model legislation given here is for the public good.
Lobbying organizations market their proposed legislation with such misleading phrases as "strong laws." States are ranked by the NAPCS and the CER (Center for Education Reform) according to how "strong" their charter laws are, when in reality the rankings reflect the extent to which these laws comply with the desire of special interests. In other words, so-called "strong" laws are actually weak laws. The public should not be misled by this. The massive amount of abuse that has already occurred within the charter school system can be traced directly to the inadequate oversight and regulation intentionally built into most states' charter school statutes.
The model laws are organized in the following sections:
A. Charter application and authorization
B. Funding
C. Oversight
D. Management
E. Reporting and disclosure
F. Procurement
G. Hiring
H. Collection of data
I. Integrity of standardized test results
J. Enrollment and admissions
K. Equal treatment for all students
L. Conflicts of interest, lobbying, and political influence
M. School extracurricular activities
N. Parental rights
O. Teachers' and employees' rights
P. Curriculum
Q. Student safety and privacy
A. CHARTER APPLICATION AND AUTHORIZATION
1. All charter schools must be authorized only by the local school board of the district in which the charter school is to be located. No other authorizing agencies are allowed, with the sole exception given in 2. below.
2. Appeal of denial of a charter school application is allowed only in districts where the local school board is not elected. In such a case, a single elected state-level commission (hereafter referred to as the "State Charter School Appeal Commission") may be given the power to overturn the decision.
3. For all pending applications before either the school district or the State Charter School Appeal Commission, at least two public hearings must be held in a location within 25 miles of where the proposed charter school is to be located. At least one hearing should take place outside normal working hours. Advance notice of at least 2 weeks for each hearing must be posted on the website of both the district and the State Charter School Commission.
4. Both the school district and the State Charter School Appeal Commission must maintain a webpage with information on pending applications. This webpage must list all pending charter school applications and the full legal names of all applicants associated with them, as well as a clear exposition of the authorization process and the time, dates, and locations of all public hearings. Such information should remain available for past years as well. Full copies of pending applications should be available for download on these webpages.
5. Applicants for a charter school must use their full legal name as it appears on government documents such as driver's licenses, birth certificates and passports. All other names they have used in the past must be clearly disclosed in the application.
6. All charter applications must include a section for each of the applicants listing any previous charter schools or proposed charter schools that these individuals have been involved with in any capacity, whether as board member, administrator, staff member, teacher, contractor, consultant, etc.
7. All charter school applications must list the full legal names of any individuals or other entities who served as paid consultants or otherwise assisted in writing the application.
8. Charter school applications may not contain plagiarized text. Fair-use quotations are allowed as long as the sources are clearly acknowledged. Each application must contain a yes/no answer regarding the question of whether significant portions of the application are based on any previous charter application, even if outside the district or in another state. If a "yes" answer is shown, information about all such previous applications must be listed, including the official name and location of the proposed (or existing) school, and the full legal names of all applicants.
9. Charter school applications must contain a yes/no answer to the question of whether the school model, plan or curriculum is based (whether entirely or in any significant part) on that of an already existing school, whether public or private, or is based on any previous failed charter school applications. This includes schools or failed school applications in other states as well as schools in other countries.
10. If the charter applicants have made an agreement to transfer control of the charter school to another board, corporation, group of individuals, or charter management organization, subsequent to authorization, this must be fully disclosed.
11. When a charter application is presented to an authorizing entity for consideration, the official applicants (the ones who will be awarded the contract) must answer questions. The use of hired public relations employees as intermediaries is not allowed.
12. All charter holders and charter management corporations must have federal 501(c)3 status and cannot be subsidiaries of for-profit corporations.
13. The initial charter contract period shall not exceed 3 years. Subsequent contract periods shall not exceed 4 years.
14. At least 50% of the charter applicants must have resided within 100 miles of the proposed school location for at least 5 years.
15. At least 50% of the charter applicants must be U.S. citizens.
16. Failure to fully comply with any of the requirements for charter school applications may be grounds for denial.
17. Charter applicants are not allowed to sue any school district over denial of an application, or any other grievance associated with an existing charter school or a charter application.
18. Elected school board members are not legally required to approve a charter school application even if it meets all legal requirements.
B. FUNDING
1. Charter schools will receive the same per-pupil amount that the local school district receives. If the district authorized the school, these funds will come from the district budget. If the district denied the application and the State Charter School Appeal Commission subsequently overturned the denial, all funds for the charter school must come from separate state funds and not from the local district.
2. Charter schools will not receive any additional government funding or subsidy for facilities, either in the form of direct grants or through tax-exempt bond issues. No public funds will be used to guarantee bonds for charter schools, and no government agencies will authorize bonds for charter schools, even if these bonds do not involve public monies.
3. Charter school facilities will not be granted any exemption or reduction in real estate taxes.
4. Charter schools receiving any services from a school district, including for example transportation, meals, and special education services, must pay the district the full cost of these services. No district will be forced involuntarily to provide such services.
C. OVERSIGHT
1. The local school board must file an annual report disclosing the full cost of all charter schools in the district. This will include not only direct funds disbursed to the school, but also all costs associated with charter school authorization and oversight, as well as any district services (transportation, special education services, etc) provided to the charter schools, and any legal costs.
2. A state-level regulatory agency entirely separate from the State Charter School Appeal Commission (hereafter referred to as the State Charter School Oversight Bureau) will be formed for the purpose of charter school oversight. This agency must be unambiguously regulatory, non-partisan, and neutral in nature, and will not be allowed to simultaneously advocate for charter schools.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will not collect any percentage of charter schools' revenue to cover costs of oversight. It will be funded through separate state funds, and it must be adequately staffed and funded. It must have at least one full-time staff member for every 20 charter schools.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau's responsibilities will be to (i) ensure that all charter schools are audited annually, and to make these audits accessible on its website; (ii) allow charter school parents to file complaints and appeal decisions in situations where communicating with the school administration or the local school board is insufficient to resolve the issue; (iii) ensure that charter operators maintain non-profit status; (iv) enforce all laws regarding charter operation; (v) ensure that charter school operators have no financial conflicts of interest; (vi) mediate any disputes between the district and the charter school.
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to force closure of a charter school, even if the local school district is not in agreement, if it finds either excessive financial abuses, or excessive conflicts of interest, or an excessive record of valid, verifiable complaints from parents, students, or teachers.
6. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may at any time request a charter school's waiting lists for enrollment. The waiting list must include street addresses and phone numbers or email addresses. If the State Charter School Oversight Bureau determines that a name on the waiting list is in error, it must be removed from the list. Charter schools that publicize the number of students on their waiting lists and are found to have chronically excessive numbers of erroneous names on these lists may be fined up to $10000 by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, at its discretion.
D. MANAGEMENT
1. No out-of-state management organizations or governing boards are permitted.
2. Charter schools may not contract with for-profit management organizations or educational service providers.
3. A charter school may not transfer more than 10% of its annual revenue each year to a management organization.
4. A charter school may not contract to a management organization or educational service provider that has overlapping board members, owners, or administrators, or that has board members, owners, administrators or employees who have a familial relation with any of the charter school's board members or administrators. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to make determinations regarding whether a management organization or educational service provider appears to be a related party or is somehow in financial collusion with the charter school, and such a determination will be considered final. In the event of such a determination, the charter school must immediately cease its financial relation with the
management organization or educational service provider.
E. REPORTING & DISCLOSURE
1. Charter school report cards must contain all information included on report cards of regular district schools, and must be made available to the public at the same time and through the same means as district school report cards. Any charter school found to have deliberately distorted its demographic or other data may be fined up to $10000 at the discretion of the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
2. All charter schools must prepare an annual report, made available to the public at the charter school website, detailing the following:
3. Charter schools must maintain a website with the following information accessible to the public from links shown on the school's home page:
4. The charter school must maintain a webpage clearly showing:
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to impose fines up to an amount of $10000 on charter schools that do not show a good faith effort to maintain the required information listed in items 2, 3 and 4 above on their website. Chronic failure to comply may be grounds for closure.
6. Open meeting laws and sunshine (public records access) laws will apply fully to charter schools. Members of the public must be allowed to comment at all board meetings.
7. Any charter found to be using tactics to evade public attendance at board meetings (last minute rescheduling or change of location, failure to provide adequate notice, etc), or found to be excessively uncooperative or tardy with public records requests, may be fined up to $10000. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be authorized to investigate allegations of such abuses, and to impose such fines, which will go into the state's general fund.
8. Charter schools will be given one month to comply with public records requests, and any member of the public who cannot afford to pay for paper copies may request digital versions of documents free of charge. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be empowered to determine whether the charter school should be allowed more time in the case of extenuating circumstances, or if a particularly large number of documents has been requested. If the request involves documents totaling more than 1000 pages,
the State Charter School Oversight Bureau has the discretion to require that the requesting individual pay the charter school a nominal fee, not to exceed 5 cents per page, to cover the cost of document scanning. The charge for paper records cannot exceed 10 cents per page, and fees may be waived, at the discretion of the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, for any member of the public who has been deemed by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau to be unable to afford the charges.
9. Charter school management organizations or educational management organizations must comply with all open meeting laws and public records request laws that the charter school itself is required to comply with.
10. A charter school will provide parents and any members of the public who request it with a list of the full legal names of all teachers and staff as well as any nicknames, aliases, or prior names they have used either at the school or at any other place of employment. Members of the public will be allowed to inspect teachers’ resumes at the school site. These resumes will include the full legal names of all schools or educational institutions at which the individual worked at previously, whether in the US or in another country. If the name of an institution is written in another language or alphabet, both that official name as well as an English transliteration that is as accurate and complete as possible will be given. Vague descriptions such as “taught at private high school in Mongolia" will not be acceptable.
11. All administrators and board members of the school must annually prepare a signed statement listing any potential conflicts of interest, and stating specifically whether the school did any business or engaged in any activities in which these individuals had a financial interest. The school must retain these forms for at least 10 years. The forms must be provided to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau upon request.
F. PROCUREMENT
1. All contracts above $1000 must be awarded through a competitive bidding process. If a single vendor is to receive more than a total of $1000 through multiple contracts, these must also be through a competitive bidding process. The $1000 limit applies over multiple years. On any occasion where the lowest bidder is not chosen, the charter school must be prepared to justify its decision to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
2. Charter schools must be prepared to justify their choice of vendors to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau in any case where a single vendor received more than $1000, whether from a single purchase or contract, or multiple purchases or contracts.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to make a determination that a vendor was not chosen through a fair competitive bidding process, and to compel the charter school to cease using the vendor for a specified period of time.
4. Charter schools may not use vendors whose owners, administrators, board members, or majority shareholders have any overlap with, or have a familial relation with, any of the charter school's board members or administrators.
5. The annual amount that a charter school spends on advertising, public relations, and reputation management, may not exceed 0.5% of its annual revenue.
G. HIRING
1. Charter schools may not hire a non-US citizen when an equally- or better-qualified US citizen is available for the position.
2. Charter school funds may not be used for immigration expenses, including visa fees and attorneys' fees, for an employee, prospective employee, or family member of an employee or prospective employee.
3. Charter schools may not pay international recruiting agencies with school funds.
H. COLLECTION OF DATA
1. Demographic data submitted by parents to be used for the school report card will be sent directly to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, which will be responsible for aggregating it and reporting it. The charter school itself will not process these data.
2. For each student that leaves the school, an exit form will be submitted by the school to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. This form must contain contact information for the parents, and the reason for exit. If the student is coded as “not dropping out of school,” (i.e., the student will not count towards the school’s official dropout rate), the name of the school the student intends to transfer to must be listed. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to contact parents to verify the accuracy of any information on this form.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will issue an annual report on charter school attrition rates, and statistics on the most commonly reported reasons for exit. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be empowered to conduct, at its discretion, random surveys of parents of students who exited from any charter school to determine reasons for leaving.
I. INTEGRITY OF STANDARDIZED TEST RESULTS
1. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will keep a database with longitudinal records of standardized test scores of individual students (whether attending a district school or a charter school). This database will contain an anonymizing student identification number (unrelated to any other government-issued number such as social security number) rather than their name; the test scores for each school year; and the name of the school(s) the student attended that year. It may also contain demographic information for the student. The database will never be released to any third party. Each student record will be deleted from the database 10 years after the last entry was made for that student. A full-time qualified analyst will be hired by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau and charged with analyzing these data to ensure that there are no statistical anomalies associated with a particular school. The data will be kept in a secured location, with only a limited number of staff having access to it. Intentional unauthorized transfer of the data will be a criminal offense, entailing a fine of up to $50000 and up to six months in jail. Privacy breaches due to negligence will not be criminal offenses but will entail fines up to $25000.
2. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be charged with investigating any school found to have anomalies in test results. The investigation may include using Bureau staff to proctor standardized tests at the school site. The Bureau is empowered to require retesting of an entire class if it determines that the test results were particularly anomalous.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to send personnel to any charter school under its jurisdiction for random proctoring of state standardized tests. No advance notice is required. When these personnel arrive at the school, they will specify which classes they wish to proctor. School officials must allow them to take control of the specified classrooms for the duration of the test, and to collect and retain the completed test forms and submit them directly to the state without any interference. Bureau officials will not have to justify their decision to proctor or their choice of class to the school.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may require the charter school to produce lists of class enrollment as well as attendance on testing day, and it is empowered to contact parents to investigate reasons for non-attendance of students on testing days.
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to inspect records of AP tests taken at the school site, and to have staff present when such exams are administered, at its discretion.
6. Any teacher, employee, or parent may anonymously report anomalies, suspected irregularities, or other concerns about standardized tests to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. Fines of up to $10000 may be imposed on any staff members found to have leaked the names of these individuals to the public or to anyone else at the charter school.
7. Charter school employees reporting anomalies, suspected irregularities, or other concerns about standardized tests to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau are granted whistle-blower protection. A charter school may not fire a teacher or employee in retaliation for such reporting. If a charter school is found to be intimidating teachers or other employees who report suspicious activity to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, it may be grounds for closure.
J. ENROLLMENT AND ADMISSIONS
1. All applications for admission to a charter school must be submitted directly to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. The charter school is not allowed to handle these applications, even as an intermediary.
2. Any admissions lotteries are to be conducted by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, without the involvement of any school officials.
3. A charter school may not require that parents and/or students visit the school or be interviewed before or in conjunction with applying for admission.
4. All student application forms for charter schools must state clearly at the top of the form: "State law does not allow charter schools to deny admission based on academic or athletic ability, disciplinary records, special needs, or the existence of current or prior IEPs."
5. The same standard student application form will be used for all charter schools.
6. No application form for charter school admission may include requests for ANY information about past academic or disciplinary status of a student. This includes, but is not limited to, information about past standardized test scores, awards, suspensions, participation in a gifted program, existence of an IEP, and teacher recommendations.
7. No application form for charter school admission may have attached to it any form relating to admission to, or request for admission to, or request for information on, gifted or remedial programs.
8. No tests of any sort will be administered to any student in conjunction with their charter school application form before a decision has been made regarding admission. This includes "placement" tests.
9. Charter schools may not require either parents or students to sign any contracts as a condition of admission.
10. No fees can be imposed on students unless they are for voluntary extracurricular activities. Fully refundable deposits for books or computers or other instructional material issued to students may be required, but must be waived in cases of need. While the charter school may make the initial determination of whether need exists, the State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to handle appeals and to make a final decision regarding deposit waivers.
11. Charter schools may not request donations in conjunction with the admissions process, and are not allowed to require parents to commit to volunteer time as a requirement for admission.
12. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to verify enrollment records.
13. All literature that a charter school distributes for recruitment, or for informational or advertisement purposes, to the general community must clearly state "[Charter school name] must, by law, accept all students regardless of academic, athletic or other ability or disabilities."
K. EQUAL TREATMENT FOR ALL STUDENTS
1. Charter schools will be financially penalized proportional to their failure to enroll special needs students. The difference between the percentage of special needs students at the charter and the overall average percentage of special needs children in the district or districts from which they recruit (weighted according to percentage of students from each district) will be determined. The charter school will have its per-student funding reduced by this same percentage.
2. Charter schools will not be allowed to have any more stringent requirements for students to be promoted to the next grade than the resident school district. If a charter school notifies a parent that a student will not be promoted, and the parent feels the criteria are more stringent than the local district, the parent has the right to file a complaint with the authorizing school board, and, if necessary, to appeal to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
3. Charter schools will not be allowed to have any more stringent conditions for student suspension and expulsion than the resident school district. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau board will be empowered to investigate and reverse suspensions and expulsions of students.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to investigate charter schools for excessive (significantly higher than average) rates of suspension or expulsion, including cases where the excess is in a particular demographic group, or is concentrated on special needs or lower-performing students.
5. Eligibility for field trips and extracurricular activities must be according to clearly delineated policies, and parents may request copies of these policies. If only certain members of a class are chosen for a field trip, for example, it cannot be simply because a teacher or an administrator decided who could attend. Academic performance and disciplinary records may be considered when deciding on eligibility for field trips, but the criteria must clear and applied equally to all students.
L. CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, LOBBYING, AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE
1. Advertising on school premises, during school functions including extracurricular activities, or during school hours, for any business interests in which the school administration, board members, or any employee of the school has a financial or other significant interest is not allowed.
2. If an official charged with charter school regulation (such as a State Charter School Oversight Bureau employee or authorizing school board employee) is running for public office, he should not be permitted to accept a donation from any employees of a charter school under his oversight.
3. No charter school should be allowed to conduct political lobbying during school hours or using school resources. Charter school administrators, board members, or employees may not organize political lobbying events involving students and parents at the school. Students may not be taken on school-sponsored or school-organized field trips to attend political rallies or events with a particular political orientation (including pro-charter-school events) during school hours, and such events should not be supported with public school funds.
4. Charter schools may not engage in a practice of inviting public officials to visit the school, or visiting public officials with students, if the visits appear to be mainly for advertising or lobbying rather than educational purposes.
5. Charter schools may not use school premises or school resources to solicit for donations to a charity that they have any connections to or interest in.
6. No charter school administrator is allowed to hold a second job if it results in more than full-time employment. That is, if an administrator is employed full-time by the school, he cannot simultaneously receive compensation for another position, even if part-time. This includes paid positions such as post-doctoral fellowships, and also includes any paid position held in any foreign country.
M. SCHOOL EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
1. Any academic, athletic or other competitions that students of the charter school enter in as part of school-sponsored activities must be approved by the authorizing school board, to ensure they satisfy adequate ethical standards regarding entrance and judging. The authorizing school board may request information on entrance and judging procedures from the organizers of the competition, and failure to receive such information may be grounds for withholding approval. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is also empowered to investigate cases where charter school students participate in competitions that are suspected of bias or other mismanagement.
2. For all out-of-town field trips, a full itinerary including names of cities/towns and names, addresses, phone numbers and emails (if applicable) of all hotels/dormitories/homes where students will be staying must be given to parents ahead of time. Parents must be notified immediately of any changes. A contact person must be designated for each student, and must be continually accessible by phone or email.
3. Charter school employees, volunteers, or parents who drive students other than their own children in their personal vehicles for school-sponsored activities must ensure that students wear seat belts, and that students who are too young to do so are not seated behind airbags. Such individuals are required to make a reasonable effort to keep their vehicles in good repair, and are prohibited from driving students if they know that their vehicles have any maintenance problems that could affect safety (for example, excessively worn tires).
4. All vehicles and drivers used for transporting charter school students for school-sponsored activities must be fully insured.
5. Any individual who has had a (single) moving violation in any state cannot drive charter school students on school-sponsored activities for the next 6 months. After a second moving violation they may not drive students for 2 years, and after a third moving violation they will not be permitted to drive students again without receiving professional training and getting a school bus driver license.
6. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to investigate any inappropriate or unsafe events that occur during charter school-sponsored field trips or extracurricular activities. Incidents found to put students in unsafe or inappropriate situations may be grounds for charter school probation or closure.
7. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may, at its discretion, prohibit charter schools from sending students to extracurricular events that appear to be primarily designed to indoctrinate students in the nationalism of a country other than the United States of America.
N. PARENTAL RIGHTS
1. Parents have the right to file complaints with the authorizing school board, or with the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, regarding any charter school. If these individuals request anonymity, their names may not be disclosed to the charter school or the public.
2. The authorizing school board or State Charter School Oversight Bureau can decide to conduct an investigation based on parents' complaints, even if they do not concern a violation of the charter contract. The authorizing school board must take into account the complaint records when making its decision on charter renewal.
3. Charter schools or charter holder corporations may not send letters of legal intimidation to parents in cases where they have no legal standing for action.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to fine charter schools up to $10000 if their representatives deliberately or knowingly lie to parents or the public about any aspect of the school’s operations. For example, if claims of long waiting lists are found to be inflated and there is evidence that this was deliberate rather than an honest mistake, the charter school may be fined.
5. A charter school may not engage in any sort of obstructionism or harassment against parents who seek to form a parent organization (or parent-teacher organization) that is independent of the school administration. Parents have the right to inform other parents of such an organization on the school premises.
6. A charter school may not prevent parents from distributing any sort of literature or printed matter to other parents on the school premises, unless the material promotes any illegal activity (violence, etc) or contains text or images that are inappropriate for viewing by minors.
7. Information about serious offenses taking place on campus (i.e., any event that necessitated calling law enforcement) must be disclosed to parents. Names of students involved, if they are minors, do not have to be disclosed because of privacy concerns, but the time and nature of the incident must be reported, as well as the school’s response.
8. If a student lodges any serious complaint with the charter school administration regarding a teacher’s or another student’s conduct (i.e., complaint of physical or sexual abuse), the student’s parent(s) must be immediately informed.
9. Phone "apps" or other software given to parents for purposes such as tracking their child's performance cannot contain any tracking or surveillance features unless parents are fully informed of this and have signed a consent form.
10. The charter school is not allowed to maintain a database containing IP addresses, times of access, or other information about parents who visit the school website or who access student information online.
O. TEACHERS' AND EMPLOYEES' RIGHTS
1. Teachers and employees may not be fired in retaliation for reporting illegal activities occurring in a charter school.
2. Teachers and employees may not be fired in retaliation for activities relating to unionizing.
3. Teachers and employees must be informed of: the location of any video or audio recording devices located in the school or in their classroom; who is authorized to view or listen to such recordings and for what purpose; and how long such recordings are kept.
P. CURRICULUM
1. A charter school is not permitted to have a special focus on a particular ethnic group, culture, or country, particularly if this ethnic group, culture or country happens to be the one that its founders and/or operators belong to or originate from.
2. The curriculum of a charter school cannot be designed to create sympathy to, or feelings of loyalty for, a particular country other than the United States of America.
3. A charter school may not require proof of admission to an institution of higher learning, or the submission of applications to an institution of higher learning, as a condition for graduation, or for passing any classes.
Q. STUDENT SAFETY AND PRIVACY
1. Charter schools must disclose to parents their policies on collection of data on students and their families. Charter schools may not allowed to develop databases on parents and students using data collected during school operations (including school-sponsored extracurricular activities or home visits) for any purpose other than providing instruction, and they may not be allowed to share these data with third parties, or to use these data for marketing or political lobbying purposes. They must disclose how long such data are kept, and who has access to it. Violation of the data collection and storage policy may be grounds for school closure. Charter operators will not become exempt from these requirements in the event their charter is rescinded, whether voluntarily or not.
2. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to inspect charter school databases, and to randomly and without advance notice inspect any school-owned computers on the school site to investigate how school data are stored, and what sort of data are being collected on students.
3. If surveillance cameras are located in school bathrooms or locker rooms, signs warning students must be prominently placed in these rooms. Parents must also be informed of this. Cameras in bathrooms must be so located that they only cover the entryway areas or areas with sinks; they cannot be directed towards the stalls. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to inspect any school surveillance system, as well as any video footage taken with it, to ensure that students' rights to privacy are not violated.
4. School-issued laptops may not contain any tracking or surveillance software or any other software that could potentially affect privacy that is not fully disclosed to parents and students.
5. Charter schools must disclose to all parents their policy on video and audio surveillance of the school premises. They must disclose the location of all recording devices, how long the recordings are kept, and who has access to them. Any intentional failure to disclose this information, or willful violation of the conditions regarding storage and access to these recordings will be a misdemeanor offense. No such recordings may leave the state in which the school is located, and reasonable efforts are required to ensure that they do not fall in the hands of third parties. Upon termination of the charter contract, any video or audio recordings made of parents or students must be surrendered to the local school board.
6. Charter schools may not ask parents to sign general release forms permitting the school to use or retain any or all recordings or photos of students for promotional purposes. All release forms should be specific to one particular event (e.g., a school performance). A parent that has signed such a release may later rescind their authorization, at which point the school must immediately cease to make any additional use of any recordings or photos of the student, even if they were made during the time period when the parent had given authorization.
7. All data collected on students and parents in the course of school operations must be surrendered to the local school board within two weeks of termination of the charter contract.
8. Charter school administrators may not change a class grade that a teacher has assigned.
9. A charter school is prohibited from engaging in a concerted effort (involving the collusion of two or more people) to use its access to students for purposes of recruiting these students to a particular group, religion, belief system, or nationalistic or political view.
10. All sexual abuse or harassment claims relating to events at the charter school site must be filed with the authorizing school board or State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
11. No recruitment, whether official or unofficial, of students for colleges or businesses in which the charter school operator has a financial interest may take place during school hours or during any school-sponsored after-school activities.
12. A charter school may not have any school-sanctioned policy of encouraging off-hours socialization, either in-person or online, between students and either teachers, administrators, or other school employees. For example, teachers may not regularly take select groups of students out to dinner or invite them to visit his home.
13. If a charter school employee has ever lived in a foreign country, the criminal background check process must include the registry of criminals and sex offenders in that country.
Lobbying organizations such as ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange Council) and the NAPCS (National Alliance for Public Charter Schools) provide state lawmakers with model charter school laws that benefit special interest groups. In contrast, the model legislation given here is for the public good.
Lobbying organizations market their proposed legislation with such misleading phrases as "strong laws." States are ranked by the NAPCS and the CER (Center for Education Reform) according to how "strong" their charter laws are, when in reality the rankings reflect the extent to which these laws comply with the desire of special interests. In other words, so-called "strong" laws are actually weak laws. The public should not be misled by this. The massive amount of abuse that has already occurred within the charter school system can be traced directly to the inadequate oversight and regulation intentionally built into most states' charter school statutes.
The model laws are organized in the following sections:
A. Charter application and authorization
B. Funding
C. Oversight
D. Management
E. Reporting and disclosure
F. Procurement
G. Hiring
H. Collection of data
I. Integrity of standardized test results
J. Enrollment and admissions
K. Equal treatment for all students
L. Conflicts of interest, lobbying, and political influence
M. School extracurricular activities
N. Parental rights
O. Teachers' and employees' rights
P. Curriculum
Q. Student safety and privacy
A. CHARTER APPLICATION AND AUTHORIZATION
1. All charter schools must be authorized only by the local school board of the district in which the charter school is to be located. No other authorizing agencies are allowed, with the sole exception given in 2. below.
2. Appeal of denial of a charter school application is allowed only in districts where the local school board is not elected. In such a case, a single elected state-level commission (hereafter referred to as the "State Charter School Appeal Commission") may be given the power to overturn the decision.
3. For all pending applications before either the school district or the State Charter School Appeal Commission, at least two public hearings must be held in a location within 25 miles of where the proposed charter school is to be located. At least one hearing should take place outside normal working hours. Advance notice of at least 2 weeks for each hearing must be posted on the website of both the district and the State Charter School Commission.
4. Both the school district and the State Charter School Appeal Commission must maintain a webpage with information on pending applications. This webpage must list all pending charter school applications and the full legal names of all applicants associated with them, as well as a clear exposition of the authorization process and the time, dates, and locations of all public hearings. Such information should remain available for past years as well. Full copies of pending applications should be available for download on these webpages.
5. Applicants for a charter school must use their full legal name as it appears on government documents such as driver's licenses, birth certificates and passports. All other names they have used in the past must be clearly disclosed in the application.
6. All charter applications must include a section for each of the applicants listing any previous charter schools or proposed charter schools that these individuals have been involved with in any capacity, whether as board member, administrator, staff member, teacher, contractor, consultant, etc.
7. All charter school applications must list the full legal names of any individuals or other entities who served as paid consultants or otherwise assisted in writing the application.
8. Charter school applications may not contain plagiarized text. Fair-use quotations are allowed as long as the sources are clearly acknowledged. Each application must contain a yes/no answer regarding the question of whether significant portions of the application are based on any previous charter application, even if outside the district or in another state. If a "yes" answer is shown, information about all such previous applications must be listed, including the official name and location of the proposed (or existing) school, and the full legal names of all applicants.
9. Charter school applications must contain a yes/no answer to the question of whether the school model, plan or curriculum is based (whether entirely or in any significant part) on that of an already existing school, whether public or private, or is based on any previous failed charter school applications. This includes schools or failed school applications in other states as well as schools in other countries.
10. If the charter applicants have made an agreement to transfer control of the charter school to another board, corporation, group of individuals, or charter management organization, subsequent to authorization, this must be fully disclosed.
11. When a charter application is presented to an authorizing entity for consideration, the official applicants (the ones who will be awarded the contract) must answer questions. The use of hired public relations employees as intermediaries is not allowed.
12. All charter holders and charter management corporations must have federal 501(c)3 status and cannot be subsidiaries of for-profit corporations.
13. The initial charter contract period shall not exceed 3 years. Subsequent contract periods shall not exceed 4 years.
14. At least 50% of the charter applicants must have resided within 100 miles of the proposed school location for at least 5 years.
15. At least 50% of the charter applicants must be U.S. citizens.
16. Failure to fully comply with any of the requirements for charter school applications may be grounds for denial.
17. Charter applicants are not allowed to sue any school district over denial of an application, or any other grievance associated with an existing charter school or a charter application.
18. Elected school board members are not legally required to approve a charter school application even if it meets all legal requirements.
B. FUNDING
1. Charter schools will receive the same per-pupil amount that the local school district receives. If the district authorized the school, these funds will come from the district budget. If the district denied the application and the State Charter School Appeal Commission subsequently overturned the denial, all funds for the charter school must come from separate state funds and not from the local district.
2. Charter schools will not receive any additional government funding or subsidy for facilities, either in the form of direct grants or through tax-exempt bond issues. No public funds will be used to guarantee bonds for charter schools, and no government agencies will authorize bonds for charter schools, even if these bonds do not involve public monies.
3. Charter school facilities will not be granted any exemption or reduction in real estate taxes.
4. Charter schools receiving any services from a school district, including for example transportation, meals, and special education services, must pay the district the full cost of these services. No district will be forced involuntarily to provide such services.
C. OVERSIGHT
1. The local school board must file an annual report disclosing the full cost of all charter schools in the district. This will include not only direct funds disbursed to the school, but also all costs associated with charter school authorization and oversight, as well as any district services (transportation, special education services, etc) provided to the charter schools, and any legal costs.
2. A state-level regulatory agency entirely separate from the State Charter School Appeal Commission (hereafter referred to as the State Charter School Oversight Bureau) will be formed for the purpose of charter school oversight. This agency must be unambiguously regulatory, non-partisan, and neutral in nature, and will not be allowed to simultaneously advocate for charter schools.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will not collect any percentage of charter schools' revenue to cover costs of oversight. It will be funded through separate state funds, and it must be adequately staffed and funded. It must have at least one full-time staff member for every 20 charter schools.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau's responsibilities will be to (i) ensure that all charter schools are audited annually, and to make these audits accessible on its website; (ii) allow charter school parents to file complaints and appeal decisions in situations where communicating with the school administration or the local school board is insufficient to resolve the issue; (iii) ensure that charter operators maintain non-profit status; (iv) enforce all laws regarding charter operation; (v) ensure that charter school operators have no financial conflicts of interest; (vi) mediate any disputes between the district and the charter school.
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to force closure of a charter school, even if the local school district is not in agreement, if it finds either excessive financial abuses, or excessive conflicts of interest, or an excessive record of valid, verifiable complaints from parents, students, or teachers.
6. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may at any time request a charter school's waiting lists for enrollment. The waiting list must include street addresses and phone numbers or email addresses. If the State Charter School Oversight Bureau determines that a name on the waiting list is in error, it must be removed from the list. Charter schools that publicize the number of students on their waiting lists and are found to have chronically excessive numbers of erroneous names on these lists may be fined up to $10000 by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, at its discretion.
D. MANAGEMENT
1. No out-of-state management organizations or governing boards are permitted.
2. Charter schools may not contract with for-profit management organizations or educational service providers.
3. A charter school may not transfer more than 10% of its annual revenue each year to a management organization.
4. A charter school may not contract to a management organization or educational service provider that has overlapping board members, owners, or administrators, or that has board members, owners, administrators or employees who have a familial relation with any of the charter school's board members or administrators. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to make determinations regarding whether a management organization or educational service provider appears to be a related party or is somehow in financial collusion with the charter school, and such a determination will be considered final. In the event of such a determination, the charter school must immediately cease its financial relation with the
management organization or educational service provider.
E. REPORTING & DISCLOSURE
1. Charter school report cards must contain all information included on report cards of regular district schools, and must be made available to the public at the same time and through the same means as district school report cards. Any charter school found to have deliberately distorted its demographic or other data may be fined up to $10000 at the discretion of the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
2. All charter schools must prepare an annual report, made available to the public at the charter school website, detailing the following:
- a complete list of all grants, private and governmental, in any amount greater than $250, that were received during the past year (if a single entity gave more than one grant, the $250 limit holds for the sum of all such grants);
- a list of all contractors and vendors who received a total of more than $1000 during the past year. Full legal names of these contractors and vendors as well as their street addresses and EINs must be provided.
3. Charter schools must maintain a website with the following information accessible to the public from links shown on the school's home page:
- all state report cards since inception;
- copies of the current charter contract and all previous contracts, as well as any pending application documents relating to charter renewal;
- the exact time period of the current contract;
- all incorporation documents filed with the state for the charter holder corporation;
- an audit from an independent accounting firm for each year of operation;
- all annual financial reports submitted to government agencies;
- all IRS 990 forms for the school, its charter holder corporation, and/or its CMO/EMO;
- a complete list of administrators, teachers and staff, with their legal first and last names (if middle name/nickname is used, the legal first name must also be shown in parentheses);
- the legal name of the charter holder corporation, and any d.b.a. names it uses;
- the legal name and d.b.a. names of any CMO, EMO, or educational service provider used by the school;
- a full disclosure of any potential conflicts of interest of the school's administrators or board members;
- a list of all other charter schools with which the school has any partnership or significant relationship;
- the names of any organizations used for recruiting, employee training, hiring, curriculum or other educational services costing more than $1000 per year;
4. The charter school must maintain a webpage clearly showing:
- the dates, times, locations and agenda of all scheduled board meetings;
- the minutes of all past board meetings since inception;
- the dates, times, and locations of any public hearings relating to the school, including hearings for charter renewal, or other issues such as zoning variations.
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to impose fines up to an amount of $10000 on charter schools that do not show a good faith effort to maintain the required information listed in items 2, 3 and 4 above on their website. Chronic failure to comply may be grounds for closure.
6. Open meeting laws and sunshine (public records access) laws will apply fully to charter schools. Members of the public must be allowed to comment at all board meetings.
7. Any charter found to be using tactics to evade public attendance at board meetings (last minute rescheduling or change of location, failure to provide adequate notice, etc), or found to be excessively uncooperative or tardy with public records requests, may be fined up to $10000. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be authorized to investigate allegations of such abuses, and to impose such fines, which will go into the state's general fund.
8. Charter schools will be given one month to comply with public records requests, and any member of the public who cannot afford to pay for paper copies may request digital versions of documents free of charge. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be empowered to determine whether the charter school should be allowed more time in the case of extenuating circumstances, or if a particularly large number of documents has been requested. If the request involves documents totaling more than 1000 pages,
the State Charter School Oversight Bureau has the discretion to require that the requesting individual pay the charter school a nominal fee, not to exceed 5 cents per page, to cover the cost of document scanning. The charge for paper records cannot exceed 10 cents per page, and fees may be waived, at the discretion of the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, for any member of the public who has been deemed by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau to be unable to afford the charges.
9. Charter school management organizations or educational management organizations must comply with all open meeting laws and public records request laws that the charter school itself is required to comply with.
10. A charter school will provide parents and any members of the public who request it with a list of the full legal names of all teachers and staff as well as any nicknames, aliases, or prior names they have used either at the school or at any other place of employment. Members of the public will be allowed to inspect teachers’ resumes at the school site. These resumes will include the full legal names of all schools or educational institutions at which the individual worked at previously, whether in the US or in another country. If the name of an institution is written in another language or alphabet, both that official name as well as an English transliteration that is as accurate and complete as possible will be given. Vague descriptions such as “taught at private high school in Mongolia" will not be acceptable.
11. All administrators and board members of the school must annually prepare a signed statement listing any potential conflicts of interest, and stating specifically whether the school did any business or engaged in any activities in which these individuals had a financial interest. The school must retain these forms for at least 10 years. The forms must be provided to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau upon request.
F. PROCUREMENT
1. All contracts above $1000 must be awarded through a competitive bidding process. If a single vendor is to receive more than a total of $1000 through multiple contracts, these must also be through a competitive bidding process. The $1000 limit applies over multiple years. On any occasion where the lowest bidder is not chosen, the charter school must be prepared to justify its decision to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
2. Charter schools must be prepared to justify their choice of vendors to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau in any case where a single vendor received more than $1000, whether from a single purchase or contract, or multiple purchases or contracts.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to make a determination that a vendor was not chosen through a fair competitive bidding process, and to compel the charter school to cease using the vendor for a specified period of time.
4. Charter schools may not use vendors whose owners, administrators, board members, or majority shareholders have any overlap with, or have a familial relation with, any of the charter school's board members or administrators.
5. The annual amount that a charter school spends on advertising, public relations, and reputation management, may not exceed 0.5% of its annual revenue.
G. HIRING
1. Charter schools may not hire a non-US citizen when an equally- or better-qualified US citizen is available for the position.
2. Charter school funds may not be used for immigration expenses, including visa fees and attorneys' fees, for an employee, prospective employee, or family member of an employee or prospective employee.
3. Charter schools may not pay international recruiting agencies with school funds.
H. COLLECTION OF DATA
1. Demographic data submitted by parents to be used for the school report card will be sent directly to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, which will be responsible for aggregating it and reporting it. The charter school itself will not process these data.
2. For each student that leaves the school, an exit form will be submitted by the school to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. This form must contain contact information for the parents, and the reason for exit. If the student is coded as “not dropping out of school,” (i.e., the student will not count towards the school’s official dropout rate), the name of the school the student intends to transfer to must be listed. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to contact parents to verify the accuracy of any information on this form.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will issue an annual report on charter school attrition rates, and statistics on the most commonly reported reasons for exit. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be empowered to conduct, at its discretion, random surveys of parents of students who exited from any charter school to determine reasons for leaving.
I. INTEGRITY OF STANDARDIZED TEST RESULTS
1. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will keep a database with longitudinal records of standardized test scores of individual students (whether attending a district school or a charter school). This database will contain an anonymizing student identification number (unrelated to any other government-issued number such as social security number) rather than their name; the test scores for each school year; and the name of the school(s) the student attended that year. It may also contain demographic information for the student. The database will never be released to any third party. Each student record will be deleted from the database 10 years after the last entry was made for that student. A full-time qualified analyst will be hired by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau and charged with analyzing these data to ensure that there are no statistical anomalies associated with a particular school. The data will be kept in a secured location, with only a limited number of staff having access to it. Intentional unauthorized transfer of the data will be a criminal offense, entailing a fine of up to $50000 and up to six months in jail. Privacy breaches due to negligence will not be criminal offenses but will entail fines up to $25000.
2. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will be charged with investigating any school found to have anomalies in test results. The investigation may include using Bureau staff to proctor standardized tests at the school site. The Bureau is empowered to require retesting of an entire class if it determines that the test results were particularly anomalous.
3. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to send personnel to any charter school under its jurisdiction for random proctoring of state standardized tests. No advance notice is required. When these personnel arrive at the school, they will specify which classes they wish to proctor. School officials must allow them to take control of the specified classrooms for the duration of the test, and to collect and retain the completed test forms and submit them directly to the state without any interference. Bureau officials will not have to justify their decision to proctor or their choice of class to the school.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may require the charter school to produce lists of class enrollment as well as attendance on testing day, and it is empowered to contact parents to investigate reasons for non-attendance of students on testing days.
5. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau will have the right to inspect records of AP tests taken at the school site, and to have staff present when such exams are administered, at its discretion.
6. Any teacher, employee, or parent may anonymously report anomalies, suspected irregularities, or other concerns about standardized tests to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. Fines of up to $10000 may be imposed on any staff members found to have leaked the names of these individuals to the public or to anyone else at the charter school.
7. Charter school employees reporting anomalies, suspected irregularities, or other concerns about standardized tests to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau are granted whistle-blower protection. A charter school may not fire a teacher or employee in retaliation for such reporting. If a charter school is found to be intimidating teachers or other employees who report suspicious activity to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, it may be grounds for closure.
J. ENROLLMENT AND ADMISSIONS
1. All applications for admission to a charter school must be submitted directly to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau. The charter school is not allowed to handle these applications, even as an intermediary.
2. Any admissions lotteries are to be conducted by the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, without the involvement of any school officials.
3. A charter school may not require that parents and/or students visit the school or be interviewed before or in conjunction with applying for admission.
4. All student application forms for charter schools must state clearly at the top of the form: "State law does not allow charter schools to deny admission based on academic or athletic ability, disciplinary records, special needs, or the existence of current or prior IEPs."
5. The same standard student application form will be used for all charter schools.
6. No application form for charter school admission may include requests for ANY information about past academic or disciplinary status of a student. This includes, but is not limited to, information about past standardized test scores, awards, suspensions, participation in a gifted program, existence of an IEP, and teacher recommendations.
7. No application form for charter school admission may have attached to it any form relating to admission to, or request for admission to, or request for information on, gifted or remedial programs.
8. No tests of any sort will be administered to any student in conjunction with their charter school application form before a decision has been made regarding admission. This includes "placement" tests.
9. Charter schools may not require either parents or students to sign any contracts as a condition of admission.
10. No fees can be imposed on students unless they are for voluntary extracurricular activities. Fully refundable deposits for books or computers or other instructional material issued to students may be required, but must be waived in cases of need. While the charter school may make the initial determination of whether need exists, the State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to handle appeals and to make a final decision regarding deposit waivers.
11. Charter schools may not request donations in conjunction with the admissions process, and are not allowed to require parents to commit to volunteer time as a requirement for admission.
12. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to verify enrollment records.
13. All literature that a charter school distributes for recruitment, or for informational or advertisement purposes, to the general community must clearly state "[Charter school name] must, by law, accept all students regardless of academic, athletic or other ability or disabilities."
K. EQUAL TREATMENT FOR ALL STUDENTS
1. Charter schools will be financially penalized proportional to their failure to enroll special needs students. The difference between the percentage of special needs students at the charter and the overall average percentage of special needs children in the district or districts from which they recruit (weighted according to percentage of students from each district) will be determined. The charter school will have its per-student funding reduced by this same percentage.
2. Charter schools will not be allowed to have any more stringent requirements for students to be promoted to the next grade than the resident school district. If a charter school notifies a parent that a student will not be promoted, and the parent feels the criteria are more stringent than the local district, the parent has the right to file a complaint with the authorizing school board, and, if necessary, to appeal to the State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
3. Charter schools will not be allowed to have any more stringent conditions for student suspension and expulsion than the resident school district. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau board will be empowered to investigate and reverse suspensions and expulsions of students.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to investigate charter schools for excessive (significantly higher than average) rates of suspension or expulsion, including cases where the excess is in a particular demographic group, or is concentrated on special needs or lower-performing students.
5. Eligibility for field trips and extracurricular activities must be according to clearly delineated policies, and parents may request copies of these policies. If only certain members of a class are chosen for a field trip, for example, it cannot be simply because a teacher or an administrator decided who could attend. Academic performance and disciplinary records may be considered when deciding on eligibility for field trips, but the criteria must clear and applied equally to all students.
L. CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, LOBBYING, AND POLITICAL INFLUENCE
1. Advertising on school premises, during school functions including extracurricular activities, or during school hours, for any business interests in which the school administration, board members, or any employee of the school has a financial or other significant interest is not allowed.
2. If an official charged with charter school regulation (such as a State Charter School Oversight Bureau employee or authorizing school board employee) is running for public office, he should not be permitted to accept a donation from any employees of a charter school under his oversight.
3. No charter school should be allowed to conduct political lobbying during school hours or using school resources. Charter school administrators, board members, or employees may not organize political lobbying events involving students and parents at the school. Students may not be taken on school-sponsored or school-organized field trips to attend political rallies or events with a particular political orientation (including pro-charter-school events) during school hours, and such events should not be supported with public school funds.
4. Charter schools may not engage in a practice of inviting public officials to visit the school, or visiting public officials with students, if the visits appear to be mainly for advertising or lobbying rather than educational purposes.
5. Charter schools may not use school premises or school resources to solicit for donations to a charity that they have any connections to or interest in.
6. No charter school administrator is allowed to hold a second job if it results in more than full-time employment. That is, if an administrator is employed full-time by the school, he cannot simultaneously receive compensation for another position, even if part-time. This includes paid positions such as post-doctoral fellowships, and also includes any paid position held in any foreign country.
M. SCHOOL EXTRACURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
1. Any academic, athletic or other competitions that students of the charter school enter in as part of school-sponsored activities must be approved by the authorizing school board, to ensure they satisfy adequate ethical standards regarding entrance and judging. The authorizing school board may request information on entrance and judging procedures from the organizers of the competition, and failure to receive such information may be grounds for withholding approval. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is also empowered to investigate cases where charter school students participate in competitions that are suspected of bias or other mismanagement.
2. For all out-of-town field trips, a full itinerary including names of cities/towns and names, addresses, phone numbers and emails (if applicable) of all hotels/dormitories/homes where students will be staying must be given to parents ahead of time. Parents must be notified immediately of any changes. A contact person must be designated for each student, and must be continually accessible by phone or email.
3. Charter school employees, volunteers, or parents who drive students other than their own children in their personal vehicles for school-sponsored activities must ensure that students wear seat belts, and that students who are too young to do so are not seated behind airbags. Such individuals are required to make a reasonable effort to keep their vehicles in good repair, and are prohibited from driving students if they know that their vehicles have any maintenance problems that could affect safety (for example, excessively worn tires).
4. All vehicles and drivers used for transporting charter school students for school-sponsored activities must be fully insured.
5. Any individual who has had a (single) moving violation in any state cannot drive charter school students on school-sponsored activities for the next 6 months. After a second moving violation they may not drive students for 2 years, and after a third moving violation they will not be permitted to drive students again without receiving professional training and getting a school bus driver license.
6. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to investigate any inappropriate or unsafe events that occur during charter school-sponsored field trips or extracurricular activities. Incidents found to put students in unsafe or inappropriate situations may be grounds for charter school probation or closure.
7. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau may, at its discretion, prohibit charter schools from sending students to extracurricular events that appear to be primarily designed to indoctrinate students in the nationalism of a country other than the United States of America.
N. PARENTAL RIGHTS
1. Parents have the right to file complaints with the authorizing school board, or with the State Charter School Oversight Bureau, regarding any charter school. If these individuals request anonymity, their names may not be disclosed to the charter school or the public.
2. The authorizing school board or State Charter School Oversight Bureau can decide to conduct an investigation based on parents' complaints, even if they do not concern a violation of the charter contract. The authorizing school board must take into account the complaint records when making its decision on charter renewal.
3. Charter schools or charter holder corporations may not send letters of legal intimidation to parents in cases where they have no legal standing for action.
4. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to fine charter schools up to $10000 if their representatives deliberately or knowingly lie to parents or the public about any aspect of the school’s operations. For example, if claims of long waiting lists are found to be inflated and there is evidence that this was deliberate rather than an honest mistake, the charter school may be fined.
5. A charter school may not engage in any sort of obstructionism or harassment against parents who seek to form a parent organization (or parent-teacher organization) that is independent of the school administration. Parents have the right to inform other parents of such an organization on the school premises.
6. A charter school may not prevent parents from distributing any sort of literature or printed matter to other parents on the school premises, unless the material promotes any illegal activity (violence, etc) or contains text or images that are inappropriate for viewing by minors.
7. Information about serious offenses taking place on campus (i.e., any event that necessitated calling law enforcement) must be disclosed to parents. Names of students involved, if they are minors, do not have to be disclosed because of privacy concerns, but the time and nature of the incident must be reported, as well as the school’s response.
8. If a student lodges any serious complaint with the charter school administration regarding a teacher’s or another student’s conduct (i.e., complaint of physical or sexual abuse), the student’s parent(s) must be immediately informed.
9. Phone "apps" or other software given to parents for purposes such as tracking their child's performance cannot contain any tracking or surveillance features unless parents are fully informed of this and have signed a consent form.
10. The charter school is not allowed to maintain a database containing IP addresses, times of access, or other information about parents who visit the school website or who access student information online.
O. TEACHERS' AND EMPLOYEES' RIGHTS
1. Teachers and employees may not be fired in retaliation for reporting illegal activities occurring in a charter school.
2. Teachers and employees may not be fired in retaliation for activities relating to unionizing.
3. Teachers and employees must be informed of: the location of any video or audio recording devices located in the school or in their classroom; who is authorized to view or listen to such recordings and for what purpose; and how long such recordings are kept.
P. CURRICULUM
1. A charter school is not permitted to have a special focus on a particular ethnic group, culture, or country, particularly if this ethnic group, culture or country happens to be the one that its founders and/or operators belong to or originate from.
2. The curriculum of a charter school cannot be designed to create sympathy to, or feelings of loyalty for, a particular country other than the United States of America.
3. A charter school may not require proof of admission to an institution of higher learning, or the submission of applications to an institution of higher learning, as a condition for graduation, or for passing any classes.
Q. STUDENT SAFETY AND PRIVACY
1. Charter schools must disclose to parents their policies on collection of data on students and their families. Charter schools may not allowed to develop databases on parents and students using data collected during school operations (including school-sponsored extracurricular activities or home visits) for any purpose other than providing instruction, and they may not be allowed to share these data with third parties, or to use these data for marketing or political lobbying purposes. They must disclose how long such data are kept, and who has access to it. Violation of the data collection and storage policy may be grounds for school closure. Charter operators will not become exempt from these requirements in the event their charter is rescinded, whether voluntarily or not.
2. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to inspect charter school databases, and to randomly and without advance notice inspect any school-owned computers on the school site to investigate how school data are stored, and what sort of data are being collected on students.
3. If surveillance cameras are located in school bathrooms or locker rooms, signs warning students must be prominently placed in these rooms. Parents must also be informed of this. Cameras in bathrooms must be so located that they only cover the entryway areas or areas with sinks; they cannot be directed towards the stalls. The State Charter School Oversight Bureau is empowered to inspect any school surveillance system, as well as any video footage taken with it, to ensure that students' rights to privacy are not violated.
4. School-issued laptops may not contain any tracking or surveillance software or any other software that could potentially affect privacy that is not fully disclosed to parents and students.
5. Charter schools must disclose to all parents their policy on video and audio surveillance of the school premises. They must disclose the location of all recording devices, how long the recordings are kept, and who has access to them. Any intentional failure to disclose this information, or willful violation of the conditions regarding storage and access to these recordings will be a misdemeanor offense. No such recordings may leave the state in which the school is located, and reasonable efforts are required to ensure that they do not fall in the hands of third parties. Upon termination of the charter contract, any video or audio recordings made of parents or students must be surrendered to the local school board.
6. Charter schools may not ask parents to sign general release forms permitting the school to use or retain any or all recordings or photos of students for promotional purposes. All release forms should be specific to one particular event (e.g., a school performance). A parent that has signed such a release may later rescind their authorization, at which point the school must immediately cease to make any additional use of any recordings or photos of the student, even if they were made during the time period when the parent had given authorization.
7. All data collected on students and parents in the course of school operations must be surrendered to the local school board within two weeks of termination of the charter contract.
8. Charter school administrators may not change a class grade that a teacher has assigned.
9. A charter school is prohibited from engaging in a concerted effort (involving the collusion of two or more people) to use its access to students for purposes of recruiting these students to a particular group, religion, belief system, or nationalistic or political view.
10. All sexual abuse or harassment claims relating to events at the charter school site must be filed with the authorizing school board or State Charter School Oversight Bureau.
11. No recruitment, whether official or unofficial, of students for colleges or businesses in which the charter school operator has a financial interest may take place during school hours or during any school-sponsored after-school activities.
12. A charter school may not have any school-sanctioned policy of encouraging off-hours socialization, either in-person or online, between students and either teachers, administrators, or other school employees. For example, teachers may not regularly take select groups of students out to dinner or invite them to visit his home.
13. If a charter school employee has ever lived in a foreign country, the criminal background check process must include the registry of criminals and sex offenders in that country.