LITTLE ROCK -- The state's Charter Authorizing Panel on Wednesday approved a three-year renewal of the charter for the Arkansas Arts Academy in Rogers despite concerns about the low math achievement among its kindergarten through eighth-grade students.
The academy, which is classified as a "needs improvement" school by the state, also missed its state-set goals in math at the high school, although the scores remained relatively high.
The school, established in 2002 as the Benton County School of Arts, requested a 20-year extension of its open-enrollment charter.
Mary Ley, chief executive officer for the school, and lead Principal Barb Padgett told the panel the elementary school, unlike the high school, has had a series of principals in a short period and a lack of consistently high expectations for students and staff, which they said will change.
Ley pointed out the school has recently become a Crystal Bridges Museum of America Partner School.
"Crystal Bridges is not going away, and they will ask more of me than you ever will," Lay said in offering assurances to the panel about academic improvements.
State panel members complimented the charter school's art program and said they wanted to see the same vigor applied to the math and literacy instruction.
Also on Wednesday, the authorizing panel approved changes in locations for:
• The new Ozark Montessori Academy, which will open at 301 S. Holcomb Ave., in Springdale, a former church now serving as a veterans' center. The school initially planned to open at the Jones Community Center at 922 E. Emma Ave.
• Haas Hall Academy in Fayetteville, which will move from 3155 N. College Ave., to 3880 Front St. The new location is a vacant former Colony Shop retail store. The panel also approved the requested addition of the seventh grade to what is now an eighth through 12th grade school. The enrollment cap will grow from 320 to 400 pupils.
The panel of top-level staff at the Arkansas Department of Education gave initial approval to an expanded enrollment cap and a five-year charter renewal for Academics Plus Charter School in Maumelle -- established in 2001 and the state's oldest charter school -- over objections of the Pulaski County Special School District.
The panel's decisions on the charter renewals are now subject to review by the state Board of Education, which has the authority to accept the panel's votes or hold its own hearing on one or more of the applications. An Education Board hearing can come at the request of the charter-school operator or a local school district that opposes the charter, or on the state Education Board's own initiative.
The panel also approved a five-year charter renewal for the Arkansas Virtual Academy, which serves students statewide in kindergarten through 10th grade this year.
Panel members also questioned leaders of the Virtual Academy about low student achievement, which has it classified by the state as "needs improvement" school.
The academy, based in North Little Rock, began as a federal-grant funded program in 2002 and became a charter school later. It serves about 1,600 students in grades kindergarten through 10 this year in 71 of the state's 75 counties, Superintendent Scott Sides told the panel in asking and receiving a five-year charter renewal.
NW News on 02/19/2015