by Michelle Wirth
Amana Academy, in Fulton County, was featured in the Atlanta Business Chronicle. The charter school is the first in the world to become a Kano computing academy. The purpose of Kano is to provide an introduction to computer programming languages for children.
According to Reporter Newspapers, Georgia Chamber of Commerce President Chris Clark believes a proposed constitutional amendment that would let Georgia cities to create their own school system is unnecessary. Instead, Clark says the Georgia Chamber supports charter schools and cities should explore those options first. Clark made the comments to members of the Dunwoody Perimeter Chamber.
The Georgia Supreme Court decided not to review a lower court decision involving the Fair Dismissal Act. The Georgia Court of Appeals ruled the Fair Dismissal Act does not apply to Floyd County Schools, because the school district is a charter system.
State officials say Macon Charter Academy, which was recently put on probation by the Georgia Board of Education, is making progress but has a ways to go.
In the meantime, the governing board for Macon Charter Academy recently voted to sever ties with school founders.
DeKalb County Schools Superintendent Dr. Stephen Green says the the DeKalb County School District could explore other operating models besides a charter system.
Several reports released jointly this week say nationally students enrolled in virtual charter schools have shown weaker gains in reading and math than those who attend similar brick and mortar schools. However, virtual students in Georgia and Wisconsin outperformed their brick and mortar peers in reading
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported alleged financial mismanagement of more than $600,000 at Latin Charter Academy. The newspaper cites a police report that says former school leader Chris Clemons is currently the sole suspect.
The Georgia Charter Schools Association has released a statement in response to the alleged mismanagement.
School officials say they discovered the “questionable activity” while it was in the process of transitioning leadership from the previous fiscal year. The school’s governing board immediately reported the activity to the appropriate authorities and launched a forensic audit.
A DeKalb County parent wrote a Huffington Post essay about why white parents won’t send their children to black schools. In the essay, she said she believed her neighbors wanted to start a charter school so they could avoid sending their children to a school where the majority of students were African American. Maureen Downey spoke about the essay in her Get Schooled blog in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Downey later featured a response from a DeKalb County parent who sent his daughter to a neighborhood elementary school with a high African American population for Pre-K. Later, the parent decided to send his daughter to a charter school.
Michelle Wirth
Michelle, GCSA's Director of Communications, is an award-winning journalist with a background in strategic communications. She has a Master’s degree from the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Journalism and a Bachelor’s in Communications from the University of Denver.
