May 15
jonpeltoCharter Schools, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Hartford, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Michael Sharpe, Stefan Pryor Fuse, Hartford, Jumoke Academy, Jumoke at Milner, Malloy, Michael Sharpe, Stefan Pryor
According to the Hartford Courant’s Vanessa De La Torre, Governor Malloy joined former Hartford Mayor Thirman Milner yesterday in the library of Jumoke Academy at Milner to celebrate the success of Malloy’s “education reform” proposals.
Milner explained, “You walk in the school, you can see the difference.”
And Malloy was all too happy to take credit for the changes claiming that it was the privatization effort of his administration that accounted for the changes.
But of course, the truth is far from that.
In fact, neither Malloy nor Milner admitted that the changes aren’t due to the fact that the local elementary school was handed over, last year, to a private charter management organization but is directly attributable to the fact that the State of Connecticut and the City of Hartford are finally making a real financial investment to support the school.
Malloy and Jumoke Academy’s CEO, Michael Sharpe, would have us believe that it is the $345,000 annual contract to hire the FUSE/Jumoke Academy charter school management company that is responsible for “turning around” the Milner School…
However, the facts reveal a very different truth;
First, it wasn’t until AFTER the Milner School was added to the “Commissioner’s Network” and turned over to Jumoke that the state added well over $1 million in additional operating funds for the school and the City of Hartford provided more than $2 million in new funds to fix up the school. (Insiders report that while some of the funds have been used for cosmetic changes, the school continues to have a fairly significant rodent issue.)
Second, despite the fact that Malloy’s education reform law required that turnaround schools maintain the same entrance requirements; Jumoke was allowed to introduce a provision that prevents students from transferring into school after October 1st. This change significantly reduces the number of more transient students coming into the school, students who often arrive with a variety of educational and language challenges during the school year.
Third, an audit conducted by the State Department of Education in December revealed that Jumoke at Milner still hadn’t filled a vital bi-lingual position and that teachers were unaware or confused about whether the school’s English language development program was based in “pushing into” the classroom or “pulling” children out of the classroom for the extra help they needed
Fourth, while Jumoke CEO Sharpe told Malloy that student attendance was up and only 15 have left Jumoke at Milner to date, Sharpe failed to admit that while the school is getting significantly more resources, the total population is down significantly since last year.
And finally, as parents at Milner know, there have been significant communication problems at Jumoke Academy at Milner including a disastrous lock-down drill in which students were marched into the gym and cafeteria rather than required to stay in their rooms behind locked doors. As one parent on the scene put it, children were told to sit on the side of the gym, “in front of the inside gym windows, in plain sight.” The drill left parents and children shaken and extremely worried about whether the Jumoke Administrators were capable of handling a real emergency.
So while Malloy and Jumoke congratulate themselves about their education reform achievements, parents in every other Hartford school would do well to remember, smaller class sizes, having a teacher and an instructional assistant in every classroom and providing more support services is not a result of Malloy’s education reform efforts but a result of Malloy, the State of Connecticut and the City of Hartford actually stepping forward and providing the resources necessary to make appropriate changes —- changes that should be being made at every Hartford School if only elected officials would address the broader issue inadequate funding for Connecticut’s schools.
You can find the Courant’s account of the meeting here: http://www.courant.com/community/hartford/hc-hartford-malloy-education-0515-20130514,0,4682765.story
May 13
jonpeltoBridgeport, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Mayor Bill Finch, Michael Sharpe, Paul Vallas, Stefan Pryor Bridgeport, Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Michael Sharpe, Paul Vallas, Stefan Pryor
Re-post:
Fresh off Malloy’s “victory” of getting the Chief Operating Officer of FUSE/Jumoke Academy on to the State Board of Education, the Malloy Administration, Mayor Bill Finch and “Superintendent of Schools,” Paul Vallas, have apparently concocted a deal to hand Bridgeport’s Paul Lawrence Dunbar Elementary School over to Hartford’s Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE)/Jumoke Academy to run.
FUSE/Jumoke Academy is best known for its complete failure to provide educational opportunities to children who go home to households that don’t speak English or children who need special education services.
In fact, since Jumoke Academy opened its doors in Hartford, it has failed to admit ANY non-English speaking students or ANY students from non-English speaking households. In addition, less than 4 percent of Jumoke Academy’s students receive special education services.
All this despite the fact that the Jumoke Academy is located in Hartford; a city in which more than 1 in 4 students aren’t fluent in English, where more than 4 in 10 go home to households where English is not the primary language and where more than 1 in 10 require some type of special education services.
As a result of this new deal, FUSE/Jumoke will be given control of the Dunbar School where, according to the State Department of Education’s School Profile Database, at least 18 percent of the students go home to households where English is not the primary language and about 12 percent of the students receive special education services. Thus Team Vallas is proposing to turn a Bridgeport school over to a company that has absolutely no meaningful experience with two of the most important populations that attend Dunbar.
The Bridgeport deal would mirror the one in Hartford where FUSE/Jumoke Academy was given Hartford’s Milner School under a deal between Malloy’s Commissioner of Education, Stefan Pryor and the Hartford Public School System.
Speaking for Team Vallas about the Dunbar deal, Bridgeport’s chief operating officer, Sandra Kase, explained to the Connecticut Post that, “Jumoke rose to the top of a short list of turnaround models — the others included Classical Studies Academy, a local magnet school, and the Interdistrict Six-to-Six Magnet School in Bridgeport — because it was ready, willing and able to start this fall.”
However, it is unclear whether Vallas et. al. bothered to follow the requirements of the Commissioner’s Network planning process which includes extensive parent and public involvement before any plan can be submitted to the State Board of Education for approval. More
May 12
jonpeltoBridgeport, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Mayor Bill Finch, Paul Vallas, Stefan Pryor Bridgeport, Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Mayor Bill Finch, Paul Vallas, Stefan Pryor
Fresh off Malloy’s “victory” of getting the Chief Operating Officer of FUSE/Jumoke Academy on to the State Board of Education, the Malloy Administration, Mayor Bill Finch and “Superintendent of Schools,” Paul Vallas, have apparently concocted a deal to hand Bridgeport’s Paul Lawrence Dunbar Elementary School over to Hartford’s Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE)/Jumoke Academy to run.
FUSE/Jumoke Academy is best known for its complete failure to provide educational opportunities to Latino and non-English speaking children, children who go home to households that don’t speak English or children who need special education services.
In fact, since Jumoke Academy opened its doors in Hartford, it has failed to admit ANY non-English speaking students or ANY students from non-English speaking households. In addition, less than 4 percent of Jumoke Academy’s students receive special education services.
All this despite the fact that the Jumoke Academy is located in Hartford; a city in which more than 1 in 4 students aren’t fluent in English, where more than 4 in 10 go home to households where English is not the primary language and where more than 1 in 10 require some type of special education services.
As a result of this new deal, FUSE/Jumoke will be given control of the Dunbar School where, according to the State Department of Education’s School Profile Database, at least 18 percent of the students go home to households where English is not the primary language and about 12 percent of the students receive special education services. Thus Team Vallas is proposing to turn a Bridgeport school over to a company that has absolutely no meaningful experience with two of the most important populations that attend Dunbar. More
Apr 10
jonpeltoAchievement First/ConnCAN, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Stefan Pryor Andrea Comer, Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
Earlier today, BY A VOICE VOTE SO THAT NO ONE WOULD NEED TO BE ON RECORD, the Connecticut House of Representatives confirmed Governor Malloy’s nomination of Andrea Comer to serve a four-year term on the State Board of Education.
Comer, who works as the Chief Operations Officer for the FUSE/Jumoke Academy charter school management company, and previously worked for Commissioner Stefan Pryor’s Achievement First, Inc, one of the nation’s largest charter school management companies, will be filling the State Board of Education seat that was most recently held by an official from the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education.
Late word from some Democratic legislators was that the Malloy administration promised that the next two State Board of Education nominations would be of pro-public education supporters if Democratic legislators looked the other way and voted for the appointment of the charter school executive.
As a member of the State Board of Education, Comer will be in a unique position to directly and indirectly help her employer and the charter school industry continue their ongoing privatization efforts.
FUSE/Jumoke Inc. already collects millions of dollars in state funds distributed by the State Department of Education and has major expansion plans. Just last year, Commissioner Pryor and the State Board of Education directed that Hartford’s Milner elementary school be handed over to Jumoke to manage.
The decision to give one of Hartford’s public schools to the Jumoke Academy was not only lucrative for the Jumoke Academy but was even more noteworthy because the Milner elementary school has been one in which half the students come from households that didn’t speak English and fully one in four students weren’t fluent in English. The Jumoke Academy, by comparison, has never had a single bi-lingual student during its many years of existence and has consistently failed to provide educational services to its fair share of special education students.
The decision to nominate and confirm a high-ranking charter school executive to Connecticut’s education policy board is seen as yet another attack on Connecticut’s school teachers, the teacher unions and the 99% of student who attend public district schools.
Apr 09
jonpeltoAchievement First/ConnCAN, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor Andrea Comer, Conflict of Interest, Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
The Connecticut House of Representatives convenes tomorrow at 10 a.m.
On the calendar is House Joint Resolution No. 75. , the resolution confirming the nomination of Andrea Comer of Hartford to be a member of the State Board of Education.
If the General Assembly confirms Governor Malloy’s nomination of Andrea Comer, the COO of the FUSE/Jumoke, Inc. charter school management company, she would be a member of the State Board of Education through February 2017.
While there has been extensive coverage of Comer’s nomination here at Wait, What? there has been limited coverage in the general media.
The entire situation is a sad commentary about what some people perceive to be a conflict of interest and the general acceptance of the corporatization and privatization of public education.
The Jumoke Academy Inc. collects millions of dollars in public funds for its school in Hartford.
In addition, Commissioner Stefan Pryor gave Hartford’s Milner elementary school to the Jumoke Academy to manage. The new Jumoke Academy at Milner immediately dismissed the vast majority of Milner’s dedicated teachers and instituted their own special “operating approach.”
As Wait, What? readers know that Jumoke “operating approach” is based on a strategy of not providing education services to non-English speaking students, students who go home to households where English is not the primary language or to their fair share of students who require special education services.
Instead of taking responsibility for providing a true public education, FUSE/Jumoke Academy responds by claiming that they deserve accolades and additional funds for producing better results on Connecticut’s standardized tests.
But of course, since poverty, language barriers and special education needs are the three greatest influences on standardized test scores, it comes as no surprise that a school that accepts fewer poor students, NO bi-lingual or ESL students and far fewer special education students than its fair share would end up with a population that would have higher test scores.
But the reason that Andrea Comer’s nomination is suspect goes well beyond the discriminatory and anti-Latino policies of FUSE/Jumoke Inc.
Connecticut law frowns on conflicts of interest and potential conflicts of interest, or at least it is supposed to. Those who have contracts and benefit from state resources aren’t supposed to be in a position to reward themselves or their friends.
If Andrea Comer, the Chief Operating Officer of FUSE/Jumoke Inc., finds herself on the State Board of Education, she will certainly be in a “unique” position to directly and indirectly impact her job, her employer and the industry she has worked so hard to represent. Prior to working for FUSE/Jumoke, Inc. she worked for Achievement First, Inc., the even larger charter school management company co-founded by Stefan Pryor.
In fact, together, Achievement First and FUSE/Jumoke control more than half of the $55 -$60 million plus in taxpayer funds that flow to charter schools each year.
Finally, as we now know, Andrea Comer also has extensive experience with the so-called crime of ‘stealing” public education when she decided to keep her child in one district despite the fact that she moved to another. Comer complains that raising this point was a personal attack and that she was just looking out of the best interests of her child. While Comer, and all parents, should do whatever they legally can to look out for their children, we now know that Comer’s case was treated very, very differently than more recent Connecticut case where a woman was arrested and convicted of “stealing” education.
Sometimes it’s the “little” votes that provide voters with the best snapshot of their elected officials.
The vote on Comer’s nomination is just such a vote.
Any legislator who votes to put the COO of FUSE/Jumoke Inc. on the State Board of Education is sending a very loud and very clear message to their communities about their definition of conflict of interest and their attitudes toward protecting public resources.
For more on Comer’s nomination here are some of the Wait, What? posts on the topic:
Malloy nominates charter school corporate officer to Connecticut State Board of Education
One Adam-12, One Adam-12, we have a COI in progress
Stamford Advocate joins effort to warn about conflict of interest on State Board of Education
The complex issue of stealing public education…Just ask Malloy’s nominee for the State Board of Education
Courant focuses attention on Malloy’s nominee for State Board of Education
Oops, Malloy’s nominee to the State Board of Education didn’t quite tell the whole story
Apr 01
jonpeltoAchievement First/ConnCAN, Charter Schools, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Stefan Pryor Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
Andrea Comer skipped a few important facts when telling “her side” of the story about when her child was attending school in a district in which she did not live…
In a Wait, What? post last week, entitled The complex issue of stealing public education…Just ask Malloy’s nominee for the State Board of Education, readers learned that ten years ago, Governor Malloy’s nominee to the State Board of Education kept her child in the Windsor School System even though she had moved to Hartford.
The purpose of the Wait, What? post was not to personally attack Ms. Comer but to explore the fact that in addition to the conflict of interest Ms. Comer has by serving as the Chief Operations Officer for the FUSE/Jumoke Inc. charter school management company, the way in which her case of “stealing public education” was handled was very differently than the situation of the woman in Norwalk who was arrested and convicted of first-degree larceny for enrolling her child in the Norwalk School System when she purportedly lived in Bridgeport.
Although Comer did not reveal or explain her case when she went before the General Assembly’s Executive and Legislative Nominations Committee, the story came to light after the review of a December 2002 article in the Hartford Courant.
At the time, Windsor sent a tuition bill for $5,120, Comer told the Courant that, “she doesn’t intend to pay the tuition bill.” The story went on to note that “Comer did appeal to the Windsor Board of Education for a waiver from the residency requirement. The board denied the waiver, but said her daughter could stay in the school system if Comer paid tuition. Her appeal to the hearing division of the state department of education was also denied.”
Following the posting of the story on Wait, What? Ms. Comer took the time to post a comment to the site. In addition to challenging what she felt was a personal attack; she explained her side of the story by writing,
“With regard to my experience in Windsor, my daughter was in the 8th grade when I took the job with the Mayor’s office. It was midway through the school year when I relocated to Hartford, and I actually informed the school we were moving so they had our up-to-date contact information. To be honest, as a NY native and this being my only child, I was unaware of the residency rules, and ignorance of the law is now excuse. But I did know this: 8th grade was difficult enough for her, and I did not want her to have to attend three schools in one year. So I kept her at the middle school she was attending. I also felt it was unfair that a child’s case-by-case circumstance was not being considered in this situation, so I fought the tuition. I ultimately made payment, and it was worth every penny to provide educational stability for my daughter.”
My response then, as now, is that the report was most certainly not meant as a personal attack but that as a nominee for the State Board of Education, the entity responsible for setting education policy in the state, her job as COO for FUSE/Jumoke, Inc. and her experience with keeping her child in a school district in which she did not live were both valid issues to be raised.
This is NOT about whether Comer is a good mother.
This is about appointing the best possible candidates to the State Board of Education.
Since the original Wait, What? article was posted, additional information has become available.
When Ms. Comer wrote, “…I also felt it was unfair that a child’s case-by-case circumstance was not being considered in this situation, so I fought the tuition. I ultimately made payment…”
What she failed to explain was that in February 2002, ten months before the Hartford Courant wrote that story about Windsor’s move to get payment, the Windsor Board of Education held a special meeting to deal with Residency Case No. 02-02. (Also known as the Comer case).
At that February 27, 2002 meeting, a motion was made and seconded “that the Board of Education move to deny the appeal for Case No. 02-02.”
However, as the official minutes go on to explain, the same board member who moved to deny Ms. Comer’s appeal, “further moved that the Board of Education allow the student to attend Sage Park Middle School for the remainder of the school year at a reduced rate of tuition in recognition of the family’s circumstances. The motion was approved by a 4-0-0 vote.”
The minutes also reflect that, “Assistant Superintendent Leo Salvatore clarified the Board’s decision saying that the Board wanted to accommodate the parent’s wish for the student to stay the remainder of the year, but also had to maintain the town’s residency regulations. The conclusion was that in order for the student to finish the school year in Windsor, tuition would have to be paid for the months of March and April and the tuition for May and June would be waived.”
So the truth is that Andrea Comer did receive a bill for $5,120 after she moved to Hartford to become a spokeswoman for Hartford Mayor Eddie A. Perez, but kept her daughter enrolled in Sage Park Middle School.
However, to say “I also felt it was unfair that a child’s case-by-case circumstance was not being considered in this situation,” is totally and completely false and unfair. The Windsor Board of Education went above and beyond the call of duty to provide the child with options, but Malloy’s nominee refused to take those options and ten months later was still saying she had no intention of paying the tuition bill.
As it turns out, paying $100 a month, Ms. Comer did eventually pay the bill but to write, as she did, that “I ultimately made payment” is more than a bit disingenuous.
Comer knew she could not keep her child in the local school when she didn’t live in the district.
The district even made special provisions to address Comer’s situation.
And still she failed to fulfill her legal and moral obligation.
Put simply, considering how profound the residency issue is, it would inappropriate to put Comer on the State Board of Education.
As importantly, Comer’s position as the COO of a major charter school management company surrounds her with what can only be called a perceived conflict of interest.
In this day and age, the students, parents, teachers and taxpayers are facing enough challenges without having to deal with elected or appointed officials whose judgement is potentially contaminated by a real or perceived conflict.
If Governor Malloy does not withdrawn this nomination, the Connecticut House of Representatives has the unfortunate obligation to reject it.
You can find the initial Wait, What? post and the various comments here: http://jonathanpelto.com/2013/03/25/the-complex-issue-of-stealing-public-educationjust-ask-malloys-nominee-for-the-state-board-of-education/
In addition, the complete text of Andrea Comer’s comment on the Wait, What? Blog reads as follows:
“I have chosen to observe most of the dialogue regarding my appointment, because I realize people have philosophical differences with regard to education. However, since this has now become personal, I feel compelled to comment.
Let me start by saying that I have spent 20 years working in the interests of my community and the children who live there. The fact that it appears that the last three I have spent working for charters seems to be all that matters is disappointing. Working with young people in Hartford, I am painfully aware of what happens when education fails children. To the extent that I can support policies that change that dynamic, I will.
With regard to my experience in Windsor, my daughter was in the 8th grade when I took the job with the Mayor’s office. It was midway through the school year when I relocated to Hartford, and I actually informed the school we were moving so they had our up-to-date contact information. To be honest, as a NY native and this being my only child, I was unaware of the residency rules, and ignorance of the law is now excuse. But I did know this: 8th grade was difficult enough for her, and I did not want her to have to attend three schools in one year. So I kept her at the middle school she was attending. I also felt it was unfair that a child’s case-by-case circumstance was not being considered in this situation, so I fought the tuition. I ultimately made payment, and it was worth every penny to provide educational stability for my daughter.
My daughter is the single most important thing in the world to me – she has made me a better person, and I try to make her proud every day. I’m fine with folks opposing my job choices and my political ideals. But the choices I make as a mother in the best interests of my child should not be fodder for debate.
One final note: We all have opinions and our experiences inform those opinions. It’s disheartening that we have come to a place where public discourse cannot be respectful and in order to support our point we have to resort to personal attacks.”
Mar 27
jonpeltoAchievement First/ConnCAN, Children's Health, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Michael Sharpe, Stefan Pryor Charter Schools, Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
The Hartford Courant increased media attention on Andrea Comer, Governor Malloy’s nominee for the Connecticut State Board of Education yesterday with a story entitled, “Teachers Union Opposes Nomination Of Charter School Executive To State Board Of Education.”
Comer, who serves as the Chief Operations Officer of FUSE/Jumoke Inc., the charter school management company that owns the Jumoke Academy and the Jumoke Academy at Milner was nominated by Malloy to fill a spot on the State Board that oversees and approves Connecticut’s charter schools, along with setting policy for Connecticut’s public education system.
Prior to working for FUSE/Jumoke, Inc., Comer worked for more than two years for Achievement First, Inc., the large charter school management company that was co-founded by Connecticut’s Commissioner of Education, Stefan Pryor.
According to the Courant’s education reporter, Kathy Megan;
“Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s nomination of a charter school executive to the state Board of Education has met with a brushfire of opposition from a teachers union.
Earlier this month, Malloy nominated Andrea Comer, 47, chief operating officer for the charter school group FUSE (Family Urban Schools of Excellence), the Hartford organization that manages Jumoke Academy.
“It is extremely disappointing that the governor would appoint a person so into charter schools as she is,” said Andrea Johnson, president of the Hartford Federation of Teachers. “It’s just a slap in the face of every public school teacher. It’s terrible.’
“Once again, it’s the governor acting like the reformer that he’s not. It’s the governor and [State Education Commissioner Stefan Pryor] wanting to get more reform people into the public sector.”
Eric Bailey, spokesman for the Connecticut chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, said: “We don’t believe that her appointment to the state Board of Education represents the balanced approach necessary to ensure that the children of Connecticut are getting the kind of education they need.”
The best quote in the entire article comes from Governor Malloy’s spokesperson who sent an email to the Courant saying, “We believe the State Board of Education should reflect a diversity of opinion, and Andrea’s experience will add to the board’s diversity…” More
Mar 26
jonpeltoCharter Schools, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Stefan Pryor Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
Diane Ravitch, the leading voice of the pro-public education movement in the United States, re-posted yesterday’s Wait, What? blog on one of the controversies surrounding Governor Malloy’s nominee to the Connecticut State Board of Education.
Ravitch wrote;
“Jonathan Pelto reminds us of the national publicity about a homeless woman who was arrested and fined for the crime of enrolling her child in the Norwalk public schools when she was not a resident of that city in Connecticut.
Now Governor Dannell Malloy has nominated a woman to the state board of education even though she was in the same dispute with the Windsor schools a decade ago. But it is okay for her because she is not an indigent woman. In fact, she is the Chief Operations Officer for FUSE/Jumoke, the charter school management company that operates Jumoke Academy.
That makes a big difference”
The full Wait,What? blog can be found at: http://jonathanpelto.com/2013/03/25/the-complex-issue-of-stealing-public-educationjust-ask-malloys-nominee-for-the-state-board-of-education/
Mar 25
jonpeltoCharter Schools, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor Fuse, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, State Board of Education, Stefan Pryor
A woman is accused of stealing the cost of her child’s public education.
No, it’s not the story of Tonya McDowell, the Bridgeport woman who was arrested and pled guilty to first-degree larceny in 2011 for stealing $15,686 (the cost of her son’s education) from the Norwalk School District.
In that case, McDowell’s son was kicked out of Norwalk’s Brookside Elementary School in December 2010, when the City of Norwalk realized that McDowell didn’t live in Norwalk. McDowell, who was homeless at the time, was using her babysitter’s Norwalk address to enroll her son in the local Norwalk school. In addition to being arrested and convicted of a crime, McDowell’s babysitter was evicted from her public housing for being an accomplice to a crime.
No, this is a different case.
One that relates much more directly to education policy in Connecticut, because the person is waiting for the Connecticut House of Representatives to vote on her nomination to the Connecticut State Board of Education..
In this alleged case of stealing public education, the year was 2002, and the woman had moved from Windsor to Hartford to take a job with Mayor Eddie Perez.
The woman, Andrea Comer, is Governor Malloy’s most recent nominee for the State Board of Education. Comer presently works as the Chief Operations Officer for FUSE/Jumoke, the charter school management company that operates Jumoke Academy, Jumoke Academy at Milner and is seeking permission to expand its operations into other Hartford schools.
In Comer’s case, despite moving to Hartford, Comer kept her daughter in Windsor’s Sage Park Middle School. She explained that she didn’t want to disrupt her child’s education.
Comer appealed to the Windsor Board of Education for a waiver from the residency requirement, but they denied her request. According to a December 2002 Hartford Courant article, Windsor officials told her that “said she could stay in the school system if Comer paid tuition.”
She appealed to the hearing division of the state department of education, but was denied there as well.
She certainly knew the residency rules, but failed to enroll her daughter in a Hartford School despite the fact that she lived in Hartford,
The Windsor Board of Education had enough and sent her a bill for $5,120, the value of the education Windsor taxpayers were paying for someone who wasn’t even a resident.
At the time, Comer told the Courant that she didn’t intend to pay the tuition bill.
The president of the Windsor Board of Education defended their approach saying that residency rules are clear-cut, adding, `it’s not that we don’t feel for the families, but we have to follow the policy.’
There appear to be no media reports about how the issue was finally resolved, but it is interesting that the issue was never raised during Comer’s recent hearing before the General Assembly’s Executive and Legislative Nominations Committee.
The Norwalk case produced hundreds of stories around the nation and led to major rallies and calls for action both for and against those who would steal public education.
Comer’s case produced one story and little to no follow-up.
Of course, in Comer’s case she was an up and coming player in the Hartford political scene.
And just five years earlier, Comer had been a Hartford Courant reporter… Covering, at least in part, the Windsor Schools.
Mar 20
jonpeltoAchievement First/ConnCAN, Charter Schools, Christina Kishimoto, Education Reform, Family Urban Schools of Excellence (FUSE), Hartford, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Michael Sharpe, Stefan Pryor Achievement First, Charter Schools, Fuse, Hartford, Jumoke Academy, Malloy, Stefan Pryor
Meanwhile, as Jumoke’s Chief Operating Officer waits for the Connecticut Legislature to vote to put her on the State Board of Education, the Hartford Board of Education voted last night to direct another $1,054,143 to the Jumoke Academy and $1,173,327 to Achievement First.
On a 5 to 1 vote, the Hartford Board of Education authorized the Superintendent to accept money from America’s #1 education reformer, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The majority of the money flows through to Hartford’s two largest charter school management organizations (Jumoke and Achievement First) and even the money going to the Board of Education is restricted in such a way as to force Hartford and Connecticut taxpayers to devote even more resources to the charter school industry.
Although the Gates Foundation money is a tiny portion of the Hartford School System’s total budget, by accepting the grant, the Hartford Board is committed to instituting more standardized testing (the NWEA MAP test), supporting the expansion of more charter slots (a gift for Jumoke and Achievement First) and attaching teacher evaluation results (From the Danielson/Teachscape programs) to the NWEA MAP and other standardized test data.
Adding insult to injury, thanks in no small part to Hartford’s Mayor, the Board of Education didn’t even vote to authorize the city to go after the funds. Instead, the pro-charter school administration cut the deal with the Gates Foundation and the members of the Board of Education had the choice of accepting or rejecting the entire package. Instead of sending the deal back for more negotiations and a fairer distribution of funds, the Board rubber stamped the package. The only no vote came from Working Family Party member Robert Cotto Jr. The Democrats, as a block, sided with the charter schools.
The Gates Foundation grant directs that the money be given to Achievement First to set up a leadership training program for school administrators; that money be used to expand teacher evaluation, training and coaching program including the requirement that Achievement First play a leading role in that effort; provides funds to align Hartford’s school curricula to the new Common Core Standards; and provides funds to expand Jumoke Academy’s role as a “high performing charter school.”
It is ironic that the grant refers to Jumoke as a high performing charter school when it is clear that in a city with a high Latino population, a large non-English speaking student body and more than one in ten students needing special education services, Jumoke is a charter school company that has been completely unwilling to take on their fair share of Latino, non-English speaking and special education students.
Not surprising, but perhaps most insulting of all is that the grant must be used to “Develop Jumoke Academy’s capacity to successfully manage and implement the transformation of low-performing schools in Hartford.” This clearly indicates that some type of deal has or will be struck to hand even more Hartford schools over to the Fuse/Jumoke charter school management company.
No need to determine whether it would be more effective to develop Hartford’s own capacity to improve the existing public schools.
No need to determine whether there are other charter schools or organizations that would do a better job than Jumoke.
No need for an open, fair and competitive bidding process to determine whether Jumoke is the best private company to run those schools or whether taxpayers are getting the best rates.
No need to select a private vendor who has experience working with Latino and non-English speaking students.
No need to select a company that is experienced, willing and able to take on its fair share of special education students.
Nope, none of that.
Instead, Governor Malloy, Commissioner Pryor and the corporate education reform industry will simply continue to move forward, playing by their own set of rules, exempting themselves from the laws that apply to everyone else whenever they deems it appropriate and leaving the vast majority of students, especially Latino, non-English speaking students and students who need special education services in the dust.
And what is Governor Malloy’s solution?
Put the Chief Operating Officer of Jumoke Academy on the State Board of Education so that these policies can be promoted across the state.
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