LITTLE ROCK — The state Board of Education voted Monday to renew the charter of Academic Plus Charter School in Maumelle for another three years.
The board also removed two school districts from fiscal-distress status and assigned that classification to three other districts.
In a 7-1 vote, the board renewed the charter of Academics Plus with no change to the school’s current enrollment cap of 650 students. The board also said school officials must report back to it annually with updates.
The school had asked for a 20-year renewal and an increase of its enrollment cap to 1,300 students by 2021.
Academic Plus serves students in kindergarten through 12th grade. It became the state’s first open-enrollment public charter school when its charter was first approved in 2001.
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The board’s action followed a recommendation from the state Education Department’s 13-member Charter Renewal Council. State Education Commissioner Tom Kimbrell told the board the council believed the school had not produced strong enough results in student achievement to merit expansion, though he said recently it has shown some improvement.
Academic Plus’ student population last year was 71 percent white and 19.5 percent black. When compared to other schools with similar demographics, “they’re not where they need to be, but we see some pretty good growth in those scores,” Kimbrell said.
Rob McGill, who has been executive director of the school for a year and a half, said the school has higher graduation standards than traditional public schools, including requiring two years of a foreign language, four years of science and two credits of AP courses or concurrent college enrollment. He said the school gives parents and students more educational options.
Board member Brenda Gullett of Fayetteville noted that Academics Plus has a smaller percentage of students who are eligible for free and reduced-price lunches than most area schools.
“It looks to me like … the biggest advantage to going there is that parents get to send their children to school with other (children whose parents) can afford to buy them lunch,” she said.
McGill said he was taken aback by that comment.
“I never hear parents have the attitude of, ‘We want our kids to go here because there’s no poor kids going here,’” he said.
The Little Rock School District opposed the request. Chris Heller, attorney for the district, told the board it should renew the charter for one year at most because the future of charter schools in Pulaski County is uncertain.
Heller noted that less than two weeks ago he was in federal court arguing that the state has violated its 1989 desegregation settlement in the way it has authorized charter schools in the county. U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall has not yet ruled on a request by the district and a group of black students and parents to order the state not to approve any new charter schools in the county and to order changes to existing charters.
Also Monday, the state board voted to renew the charter of Cabot Academic Center of Excellence, a conversion charter school run by the Cabot School District, for five years. The school serves students in grades 7-12 and has an enrollment cap of 500 students.
The board also voted to renew the charter of Arkansas Virtual Academy in Little Rock for five years. The school uses long-distance learning technology to serve students across the state in kindergarten through eighth grade. It has an enrollment cap of 500 students.
In other business, the board removed the Earle and Forrest City districts from fiscal-distress status. Both districts were added to the list of financially troubled districts because of declining fund balances, Earle a year ago and Forrest City two and a half years ago.
State education officials said both districts completed financial improvement plans and complied with all recommendations from the state Education Department to turn their finances around.
The board also designated the Brinkley, Hartford and Yell County districts as fiscally distressed because of declining fund balances.