Chase Academy for Communication Arts

CHARTER SCHOOL TO CLOSE FRIDAY-STATE FUNDING CUT OFF TO CHASE ACADEMY; February 25, 2010; The Columbus Dispatch (OH) 

A South Side charter school will lock its doors for good Friday afternoon, leaving students to find new schools over the weekend.

Parents and teachers at Chase Academy for the Communication Arts were given a 24-hour notice when letters were sent home at the end of today's school day…

In what appeared to be an illegal meeting, the school board gathered today with staff behind closed doors. After the staff was dismissed, the meeting was opened to the public and the school's closure was approved in minutes.

The Ohio Department of Education will conduct an emergency enrollment review Friday at the school, 1565 Integrity Dr. E., and state auditors have stepped in to conduct a financial review.

"I didn't know anything about it. Now I don't know where my kid is going to go," said Laretha Haynes, who was picking up her daughter, a third-grader at Chase, this afternoon…

After the board meeting, Allen-Davis refused to explain what the school had done with the money it was paid by the state. Parents and former teachers painted a picture of a school in turmoil.

Jatica Miles had three children enrolled in the school, but moved them to a private school in the fall.

"One day we came in and there was no lunch for the kids because they hadn't paid the lunch people," she said. "They had to go down the street and buy Pop-Tarts and orange juice."

A teacher left in December when she said the school wouldn't pay to provide legally required services for special-needs students. Teachers and students were fleeing throughout the year, said Britt Thompson, who worked as the school-intervention specialist…

The past three state financial audits of Chase showed that the school was having difficulty tracking its spending. The school had misspent thousands in tax dollars and couldn't properly account for tens of thousands in grant money, state auditors found…

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CHARTER SCHOOL MIGHT CLOSE AFTER STATE HALTS FUNDING: CHASE ACADEMY'S ENROLLMENT CORRECTION IS COSTLY; February 24, 2010; Columbus Dispatch (OH)

No more state money is coming to a Columbus charter school, which means it likely will close.

Chase Academy for Communication Arts reported an enrollment of as many as 189 students this school year. But in January, the South Side school told the state that its monthly counts had been off and that only 108 students actually attend.

In response, the state this month stopped sending per-pupil money to Chase. No more will be sent this school year. The state has paid Chase $458,000 since the school year began.

"Those kids weren't enrolled (at any point) the entire year. They were being overpaid since the school year began," said Scott Blake, spokesman for the Ohio Department of Education…

J. Leonard Harding, executive director of the sponsoring organization, said he does not know whether parents have been notified. As of yesterday afternoon, Harding had not been able to reach the school-board president. He said ERCO wasn't aware of the enrollment error until recently.

"I'm trying to find out what's going on with this school," he said. "Now, we've got a mess here."

A state financial audit released last year showed that the school was having difficulty tracking its spending. Chase had overcharged needy students for school lunches and misspent thousands in tax dollars, and it couldn't properly account for tens of thousands in grant money, state auditors found.

Then in April, the school board fired school founder Celia Jones and said it suspected ethics violations. Board members have not detailed what those violations might have been…