Member-only story
#AnotherDayAnotherCharterScandal
Who Will Step In To Help These Students?
With allegations of harboring a bullying culture and enabling sexual misconduct, will anyone hold the NVMI charter school accountable?
“our office [works] to ensure every child has access to a safe, high-quality education.”
- José Cole-Gutiérrez,
LAUSD Charter School Division
When the Los Angeles Unified School District’s (LAUSD) School Board voted to deny the North Valley Military Institute’s (NVMI) charter renewal in 2017, the Los Angeles County Office of Education (LACOE) overruled its decision. In making this decision the LACOE board ignored the fact that a current, certified copy of the school’s required annual independent audit was not on file, that a lawsuit alleging “abhorrent child sex abuse” had been filed against the school, and that its own staff had found that NVMI was failing in governance, student achievement, organizational management, and fiscal operations.
With LACOE saving NVMI from its well-deserved death sentence, the LAUSD was powerless to keep the charter school from demanding space on one of its campuses. Under PROP-39, a charter school can force its way onto public school campuses no matter the disruption to the existing students even if that publicly funded…