Charter school backers appeal rejection/ Proponents ask state board

Backers of a proposed charter school in Harrison School District 2 have decided they aren't going to take no for an answer.

In mid-December, members of the Harrison school board rejected a plan to create a charter school for kindergarten through fifth-grade students.

On Wednesday, proponents of the Harrison Educational Arts, Research and Technology (HEART) Charter School filed an appeal with the Colorado State Board of Education asking that the Harrison board be ordered to reconsider its denial.

The state board will decide within 10 days whether to hear the appeal. If it does, the board will hold a hearing and make a decision within 60 days.

Lynne Fontanier, director of state board relations, said the board normally agrees to hear an appeal - but it's rare that the board ends up ordering a district to allow a charter school to be formed.

Instead, many of the cases are resolved through mediation and compromise, Fontanier said.

That's what HEART school backers hope. The school's nine-member board, many of whom don't live in the district, are concerned that students in District 2 are underperforming.

They envision a school that would provide a more rigorous curriculum and have longer days and a longer school year, with students staying with one teacher two or three years.

"The board's not seeing the charter as an improvement - but I do," said Liz Muntford, a HEART board member who is concerned about the future education of her 3-year-old. "They're not looking at the big picture, at what's best for the kids."

Proponents have secured a promise by a for-profit school corporation, Mosaica Education Inc., to build a school facility in exchange for a percentage of the per-pupil state funding.

Backers of the school hope to open it next fall. They'd like to start with 500 children but concede that may be too ambitious. They want to have 800 children enrolled in five years, when the school would be expanded to include students through the ninth grade.

The district already has two charter schools: the James Irwin Charter High School, which opened in September and features a college preparatory curriculum; and the Tutmose Academy, a small school serving students who have failed in a traditional school setting.

The HEART board submitted its plan to District 2 at the end of September and met with various district officials through mid- December. That's when the district held a public hearing and voted 4- 1 to deny the charter plan.

They cited concerns about the number of charter schools in the district, the loss of state funds and the higher administrative costs of the charter school.

Gregory Kanan, a Denver attorney working for HEART, said in his appeal none of those is a legally permissible reason to deny a charter application.

Appeals to the state board

The seven-member state board has heard more than 70 appeals since 1994, a year after lawmakers allowed the creation and public funding of charter schools, said Lynne Fontanier, director of state board relations. The board will decide within 10 days whether to hear the HEART school appeal.

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