Proponents of public schools say Commonwealth Charter Academy is draining school district coffers, and providing little accountability for the mounting costs.
Commonwealth Charter Academy, Pennsylvania's largest cyber charter school, has taken advocates to court rather than turn over records related to its spending.Pennsylvania’s largest cyber charter school, Commonwealth Charter Academy, has drawn scrutiny from public school advocates for spending millions of dollars on advertising and real estate. Now the charter is going to court to avoid turning over records that would give more clues as to how it’s spending taxpayer money.
Through a spokesperson, CCA said it complies with the Right-to-Know law — which entitles citizens to request public records from public agencies — while protecting family and student privacy. It said its legal arguments in the cases “speak for themselves.” Nor do meeting minutes. Minutes from September’s meeting, for instance, say board members voted to approve “proposals, agreements, and purchases,” without any mention of what those proposals, agreements, and purchases were for.
“This is a stalling tactic,” Epstein said. He said that CCA should be able to produce invoices, “just like any other public school.”In 2022, the Office of Open Records ordered Commonwealth Charter Academy to turn over records to Susan Spicka, the executive director of pro-public-education advocacy group Education Voters PA, who requested forms submitted to the charter by families seeking reimbursement for “community classes.
It said redacting the forms would not be enough because they could contain parents’ handwriting, which would reveal their identities. “Holding otherwise would undermine the purpose of promoting governmental transparency and accountability and allowing for public scrutiny of governmental activity,” she said in the filing.
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