Three Florida Charter Schools Close After School Year Opens

According to a story in online editions of the Miami Herald, three Broward County charter schools closed their doors two days ago. The enterprises (yes, that's what they are, folks) had -- ahem -- financial issues, mostly related to significant enrollment declines. That did not stop the trio of schools from registering students and starting classes for the 2012-13 year. Once the schools ran out of money and bad checks, they said "sorry" and told parents and kids to go elsewhere. One school didn't even bother with an apology: it simply locked the doors.

One obvious issue is that it's tough to transfer into another desirable school. Notably, the Florida charter trio are in tough communities whose residents hold the public schools in suspicion. Teachers from the three schools are now without work and, of course, full-time teaching slots elsewhere are now filled. One school's instructors lost pay they were owed. Meanwhile, the charters' CEOs have been less visible, and less talkative, than Greta Garbo.

Life Force Arts & Technology, a charter school in the Tampa, FL area.
It was closed more than a year ago. At one point,
school staff distributed materials
written by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard.
(Photo and link via Tampa Bay Times.)

One issue with privatization, which both Obama apologists and the right-wing have equally avoided, is trusting profit-driven business people with the development of children's minds. It's fair to accept enterprise "solutions" for school furniture. It's quite another to believe someone principally (no pun intended) motivated by financial rewards will put kids' interests ahead of his or her own. However, between the savage political ideologues and technology's smug high priests, there is no choice in the matter. They have already determined the fate of the public school system, and some collateral damage in the process is, from their perspective, "regrettable."

The Miami Herald story noted that "about 12 percent of charter schools in the past 20 years have closed, but in Florida, the closure rate is doubled, according to state figures." That stubborn fact hasn't stopped the pro-charter school drum beaters to spread their version of reality to anyone dull brained enough to listen and believe. Unsurprisingly, the Herald noted comments from a charter school advocate that indicated the Broward closures were far from the end of the world.

"'Parents at these schools voted with their feet,'" the spokesperson asserted. She just couldn't leave well enough alone: "A closure, although it's terrible from a parent point of view...I see it as a system that's working."