Sierra Crest Academy

CHARTER SCHOOL FIGHT GOING TO BOARD TONIGHT, May 19, 2010, The Record-Courier (Gardnerville, NV)

Proponents of the county's only public charter school are hoping that Douglas County school board members will override the recommendation of their own staff and renew Sierra Crest Academy's charter…

In the report, Assistant Superintendent of Education Services Lyn Gorrindo writes that Sierra Crest's curriculum is noncompliant, devoid of “standards-based” education.

“No student projects or rubrics can be produced upon request,” Gorrindo stated, referring to this academic year. “Previous years allowed for ‘double dipping' of seat time for projects in core content areas. Tracking of state standards not available. No essential content guide could be produced as described in the charter.”

Double dipping, Gorrindo said, is counting hours for one project in many different content areas. For example, she said, the school has interpreted five hours in one project to mean five hours in history, five hours in English and so forth, instead of dividing up the actual hours into their real content equivalent.

In her report, Gorrindo cites this year's audit of Sierra Crest courses. In first-semester government, students had five assignments, out of which two were based solely on participation and two were movies with questions. In first-semester chemistry, only six out of 16 assignments aligned with standards; seven of the chemistry assignments had to do with physics, and one was about loss of biodiversity.

First-semester English II had 13 assignments, out of which 10 were music lyrics, with no grades produced until Oct. 19. For first-semester English I, the district could find no grades at all, though grades appeared on the students' transcripts…

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PLANS FOR NEW CHARTER SCHOOL IN WORKS, July 2, 2010, The Record-Courier (Gardnerville, NV)

In the wake of Sierra Crest Academy's charter revocation, which was effective June 30, supporters of the closing school are banding together to form a new charter school in Carson Valley.

On Wednesday, former Sierra Crest board member Renee Sweeney said about 10 parents and at least two teachers from Sierra Crest are meeting Tuesday to form a committee and develop a new charter.

“We're not going to give up,” she said. “We need a charter school here.”

On June 8, the Douglas County School Board voted 4-2 to revoke Sierra Crest's 6-year charter. Sponsored by the Douglas County School District, the school came under fire for several compliance issues, chief among them a lack of curriculum and inadequate attendance reporting…

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Sierra Crest Academy was the worst, most violent and unorganized school I had ever gone to and I went to quite a few. Let's hope you don't ruin so may children's lives this time. I really hope no one who was involved when I was there is involved in the new charter, there was so much more scandalous behavior going on there beyond the children the teachers. It was truly shameful and they should have been arrested but no one was brave enough to speak out. I truly hope none of you are involved with the new charter. Charter schools have saved my life, this one on the other hand completely ruined mine and many others. At a very vulnerable age that needs to be taken very seriously.