Bradenton Charter School




MANATEE COUNTY -- About 100 Manatee County students will need to find a new school for next year.

After 13 years, the Bradenton Charter School is closing.

Karen Carpenter Chair of the Manatee County School board said the school is closing because the school failed to meet standards particularly in the area of curriculum and governance.


But parents like Dana Russell say the school is a safe place for children to learn. Half of the kids have learning disabilities and many others have been bullied.

“If they go to public schools they are going to be lost. But here they get one on one. I believe they need this school,” said Russell.

The Manatee School Board is planning to discuss the future of the charter school during Monday’s school board meeting.


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... Problems listed in the report include an unstable governing board, no detailed curriculum, no assessment monitoring plan, no ESE or ESOL certified staff, no food sanitation policies and lack of documentation on staff members. Bradley explained that some areas of concern are the same from the school's last review five years ago...

3 comments:

Britta Rohrer said...

Closure of the school happened June 2013. The school received a Florida Performance Grade of "B" in July. Manatee County's other schools did not fair so well. Eight (8) schools received an "F" grade and five (5) more received "D's" that, without the "One-Letter-Grade-Drop" protection, would also have been "F" schools. Technically, Manatee County had 13 "F" schools. Well, done, for closing a "B" school that dealt with a very large disabled/lower income population

All of the District's concerns were addressed in a detailed memo to approximately 40 recipients and posted to the 2013 state SIP. However the District failed to acknowledge receiving them and proceeded to close the school without any further review.

This school does not belong on this scandals list. If anything, the District does for its failure to address the point-by-point memo responding to their claims.

Anonymous said...

Closure of the school happened June 2013. The school received a Florida Performance Grade of "B" in July. Manatee County's other schools did not fair so well. Eight (8) schools received an "F" grade and five (5) more received "D's" that, without the "One-Letter-Grade-Drop" protection, would also have been "F" schools. Technically, Manatee County had 13 "F" schools. Well, done, for closing a "B" school that dealt with a very large disabled/lower income population

All of the District's concerns were addressed in a detailed memo to approximately 40 recipients and posted to the 2013 state SIP. However the District failed to acknowledge receiving them and proceeded to close the school without any further review.

This school does not belong on this scandals list. If anything, the District does for its failure to address the point-by-point memo responding to their claims.

Richard Donnelly, Former Principal said...

Bradenton Charter School was opened in 2000 and after 13 years, closed by the Manatee District in June 2013. The school consistently outperformed the district in terms of learning gains and had an excellent track record of turning struggling students around and meeting the needs of its ESE students. 2013's year end school grade was a “B.”

In 2013, the district schools did not fair well. Technically, Manatee County had 13 "F" schools.

The district's handling of the closing was fraught with errors, and omissions. All of their concerns were addressed in a detailed memo that was sent to approximately 40 district recipients. Recipients included the authors of the district report, the board members and legal counsel. The district refused to acknowledge receiving the school's response and failed to perform any further review.

No appeal was filed due to the time frame involved. In essence, by the time the appeal would have been heard, the new year would have started and the school would have had little to no funding on which to operate.

Bradenton Charter was an outstanding school. It, and a short list of other charter schools (Imagine North, Manatee School for the Arts and Science and Manatee School of the Arts) were identified by a district employee as targets for potential closure.

Bradenton Charter School does not belong on this scandals list.