Devastating Allegations Swirl around One District Charter School Program

Last night I received a phone call at 7:45.  The conversation lasted more than an hour, and the allegations were stomach churning.   The allegations are so numerous and simply so outlandish, that the pages of documentation sent to me have already been sent to our Attorney and to the Superintendent.

Sadly, I have already been able to independently confirm that some of these allegations are true.

To say I'm disappointed in what I'm reading is the understatement of the decade.

More importantly than this damning information, is the lack of knowledge about it.  The board, me and my counterparts, so far as I know, were totally left in the dark on the most severe transgressions alleged in these documents.

I'm sitting in meetings as recently as last month, glowingly praising this program----blissfully unaware that MAJOR allegations have been leveled against this program for more that a year.  Documents and phone records prove this out.

These documents, which I have turned over to Legal, show a pattern of misbehavior that could potentially result in criminal charges;  these allegations, if true, will lead to the end of careers.



These documents and this information, if proved to be true, will warrant a serious discussion about why the Escambia County School Board was not informed.  When we had problems with previous charter programs, we were kept informed.  This time, we were kept in the cellar like mushrooms.  Why?

I'm getting grief, people are mad at me for asking pointed questions of folks that should know things, it kind of reminds me of this.

I don't care if people get "mad".  I'm mad that nobody told the school board anything about this alleged grade falsification.

I want to know five things:

Who in the Escambia County School District knew of the onerous allegations of misconduct and grade altering that are being leveled against this school?

How was this program able to receive school recognition funds from Governor Scott just last week in Pensacola if the grades are not true and accurate?

When was this knowledge about alleged grade falsification gained by district employees that could have initiated an investigation?

What was done to stop this conduct?

And why was the elected board of education NOT told?


I will get to the bottom of all of this, I will take everything I have learned in the last 12 hours personally to Bill Eddins today if our attorney's opinion supports this, and I will lead the charge to run this program out of our county if these allegations are true.  there will be more to come, and it ain't gonna be pretty.......