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Karikari need to committ hari kari.

I hope they cleared this with Bill Gates in advance. I wouldn’t want them to have to give in again, like they did with the school closings.

SUNY tries to stay out of the way until issues are resolved at the school. If complainants are still unhappy after being heard by a board of a school they authorize, then the complainants have a right to go back to SUNY and ask for intervention. But if they haven’t given the board a chance to act SUNY will just refer them back.

That IS good oversight, because it’s not micromanagement. If there is something fraudulent, illegal or immoral going on here, SUNY will not stand for it. But neither will they jump to conclusions just because there’s a sensational news story.

That said, I know nothing about this situation and of course, if there’s wrongdoing then it should be punished. I’m just laying out some facts here and asking everybody to take a deep breath.

That was ugly DYH!

Nothing like a low blow when you have no argument.

GS-  don’t you have a policy on abusive posts?

BTW- I did do my homework ( see below).

KS- you may want to bone up on this scandal ridden outfit and see if SUNY CSI should be running some kind of oversight on THIS board! Please tell me if you think this is mere sensationalism or indicative of a real problem.

Things are UGLY at Merrick/Victory, and Duffy did take a job there, so there is a real connection between the two.

Besides, there is NOTHING personal between me and Michael Duffy- no ax, no smoking gun- just facts and dots connected.

As for Stringer- I am not his mouth piece.

I am the BP appointee on the CEC primarily because the law had not yet changed to allow parents whose children aged out of the district (as my son had done when he started HS this year) to serve on CEC’s last June when the Councils were formed.

I could, and thanks to your prod, possibly will, try to change my status to that of elected rather than appointed parent if my independence and role as watchdog over and administration that can not be trusted compromises the BP’s office in any way.

Stringer/his staff does not inform, or advise,  or get involved to any degree in, my blog posts, positions or actions.

Listen- why hide behind some lame pseudonym- come out and fight like a man!

Own the courage of your snarky convictions!

 Use your name!

here’s some homework for you both to check out:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704720004575377690529784252.html?mod=WSJ_Careers_Education
By BARBARA MARTINEZ
Victory Schools Inc., a for-profit charter-school operator, has hired away New York City’s charter-schools chief and is considering converting into a nonprofit.
Michael Duffy, the director of the Department of Education’s Charter School Office, will join Victory, according to representatives for both the DOE and the company. Victory helps manage 16 charter schools with 7,000 students in New York, Philadelphia and Chicago.
Mr. Duffy, whose title hasn’t yet been decided, is widely credited for accelerating charter-school growth in the city. He couldn’t be reached for comment.
The future of Victory has been the subject of interest since the spring, when the New York legislature passed a law that essentially prevents for-profit charter schools from growing. The law, which also doubled the number of charter schools allowed in the state, said no more than 10% of the state’s charter schools can be for-profit. Victory operates nine such schools in the state.
The company is considering becoming a nonprofit charter operator, but no final decision has been made, according to a person familiar with Victory’s plans.
Victory was created in 1999 by private equity manager Steven Klinsky and helped start the state’s first charter school, the Sisulu-Walker Charter School in Harlem. In general, charter operators charge a school’s board a per-pupil amount, somewhere between $1,000 and $3,000 to help manage charter schools. Some of Victory’s schools have been touted for high academic performance, including failing schools that Victory has worked to turn around.
But the company has also hit some bumps. At times, it has provided loans, with what critics charge are outsized interest rates, to the schools it helps manage. Victory has said it only loans schools money when the schools are unable to get financing any where else and that the interest rates reflect the risk that Victory is taking.
This past spring, the trustees of the State University of New York in Albany, which approve and regulate charters, voted to shut down Victory’s New Covenant Charter School in Albany. Victory had taken over management of the school in 2006, and test scores improved, but not enough to satisfy SUNY’s standards. In the end, the company lost its high-profile effort to keep the school open.
Victory is a privately held company, and its profits are not disclosed. Many observers, however, think for-profit charter operators in general, and Victory, in particular, are not very profitable at all. Still, in fighting for new charter-school regulations in Albany this year, the teachers’ unions were successful in convincing legislators that profitability and taxpayer financed charter schools, don’t go well together.
“Michael is joining Victory because he shares our steadfast commitment to students and our vision of creating outstanding schools,” James Stovall, the chief executive of Victory, said in a statement. A spokesman for the DOE said that its work on charter schools “is nationally recognized, and Michael has played an important part in that success.” He said that a national search for Mr. Duffy’s replacement will ensue.
The DOE’s charter office has at times been criticized for not being forceful enough in holding charter schools accountable on performance. But some dismissed such gripes. “It’s a huge loss for Joel Klein,” said Jeanne Allen, president of the Center for Education Reform, a Washington, D.C., a pro-charter school advocacy group. “I think Michael Duffy has done more to execute the chancellor’s interest in growing public education in a variety of forms than anyone else.”
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/03/28/2010-03-28_untitled__2charter28m.html#ixzz0kWvpvLId

Merrick Academy students suffer as State Senate President Malcolm Smith profits from charter schoolBY Rachel Monahan, Barbara Ross and Greg B. Smith DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS Sunday, March 28th 2010, 4:00 AM

Altaffer/AP
The Daily News recently found that State Senate President Malcolm Smith (center) has been receiving campaign donations from charter schools he helped found.
 Students at Merrick Academy charter school – housed in an old bowling alley in Queens Village – must cross busy Jamaica Ave. for recess in a nearby park because there’s no gym or playground.They also must get used to water leaking into classrooms when it rains and wearing winter coats inside when there’s no heat.”The school is on a very big intersection,” said Kenneth Eriaidubor, who has a second-grader and a kindergartner at Merrick. “We are very concerned that leaving a school is not a really safe zone for the children.”"There’s a leak, there’s heating problems,” said Sidney Dasent, whose daughter is a second-grader. “There’s even a problem with supplies.”There’s also another potential problem – one many parents may not know about: Merrick has served as a source of campaign funds and patronage for one of its high-profile board members – State Senate President Malcolm Smith.Smith was one of the founding members of Merrick and was on its board from the time it moved into the alley in 2001 through June 2007, records show.During that time, the K-6 charter school – run entirely with public money – has written at least three small checks to Smith’s campaign.A state controller’s audit in 2006 noted slack fiscal controls and singled out a $140 check written by a school employee to attend the fund-raiser of an unnamed state senator.The Daily News discovered there were actually three checks – all written out of Merrick’s checking accounts – to Smith’s campaign: $65 in 2003, $140 in 2004 and another $140 in 2005. At the time, Smith was on the board.While Smith was on Merrick’s board, an architect did “preliminary drawings” regarding turning the bowling alley into a school. That architect also was working on one of Smith’s personal properties at the time, records show.The same architect was also later hired to design a home owned by another Merrick board member and Smith ally, Queens Rep. Gregory Meeks.The Merrick board has been loaded up with Smith allies. Besides Meeks, there’s Smith’s former business partner Darryl Greene.In 1999, two years before he became a Merrick board member, Greene pleaded guilty to stealing $500,000 on government contracts. Greene left the Merrick board in the last few months.Until recently, another board member was Joan Flowers, campaign treasurer for Smith and Meeks. She’s a Senate staffer.Flowers also worked as counsel to Merrick for a time, pocketing a modest $19,675 in fees while she served on the board. Flowers did not return calls.Smith declined to answer questions about Merrick. Last week he came under fire for his involvement in another charter school, the Peninsula Preparatory Academy in Far Rockaway. Peninsula students were pulled out of a spacious public school in 2008 and jammed into cramped trailers without a cafeteria, gym or playground.
The trailers are on land being developed by a major donor to Smith. The donor is using the school as a selling point to market new houses being built next door.
Smith says the school was forced to move because the Department of Education refused to grant them more space. DOE officials say that isn’t true.
Across Queens at Merrick, parents acknowledge that academics have improved, but they continue to have concerns about an unsafe environment – and some have raised questions about where school money is going.
For instance, the school spent $200,000 in 2009 on “security,” but there’s no security guard.
“We don’t have security, and that’s a problem. No names are taken down,” one teacher said. “I had a parent come in. She was in my face and she was very aggressive. Another teacher that was much taller than her had to intervene.”
Dasent said he’s been asked to pitch in with basics likes color copy paper, pencils and hand sanitizer.
“That shouldn’t happen in the school with proper revenue,” Dasent said.
Circle of friends
In its early days, school officials confirmed that architect Robert Gaskin did some “preliminary drawings” on how to transform the bowling alley at 207-01 Jamaica Ave. into a school.
Records show Gaskin applying for a permit in July 2001 for the school building. At the time, records show Gaskin was also the architect of record on a two-family house on 230th St. that Smith owned and was renovating.
James Stovall, an official with Victory Schools, the for-profit company that Merrick pays to run the school, said Gaskin was not paid for his work at the school. Gaskin, who lists the Merrick job on his Web site, did not return calls to reveal how he got the job with Merrick or Smith.
In December, the Buildings Department cited Merrick for failing to fix an inoperable elevator and fined it $5,000. The school notes it has no wheelchair-bound students who would need the elevator and blamed a vendor for the violation. A settlement with the city is in the works.
Meanwhile, parents for years paid a company tied to the longtime principal, Alma Alston, for after-school activities at Merrick, records show.
Records show Alston is listed as manager, consultant and director of Creative Community Consultants, Merrick’s after-school provider. The company’s office is at the school.
“Victory was aware, did an investigation and all I can say is she is on leave of absence,” Stovall said. The school recently ended its agreement with Creative Community.
In a phone interview, Alston insisted she was “involved” in the company, but added, “The only thing I did was assist the company. They were a sponsored community-based operation.”
gsmith@nydailynews.com

see http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/06/30/2010-06-30_rushed_revote_for_troubled_charter_pta.html

t a scandal-plagued charter school, officials called for a rerun of the PTA election with just 24 hours’ notice, parents charged.
Merrick Academy tossed the results of a May election won by parent Kenneth Eriaidubor, who has publicly criticized the financial mismanagement at the school, revealed in a Daily News investigation.
“They don’t want me in,” said Eriaidubor, a vocal supporter of teachers’ efforts to gain a union contract.
The school was also ensnared in a federal probe of Senate President Malcolm Smith, a founding board member.
Outgoing PTA President Shante Spivey said there were “multiple problems” with the election, including Eriaidubor’s qualifications because he had not attended six PTA meetings – something he denies.
She said the last-minute nature of the vote was the result of a July 1 deadline the organization has for a new PTA board.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/06/30/2010-06-30_rushed_revote_for_troubled_charter_pta.html#ixzz0uXOm8HO9
 A scandal-plagued Queens charter school fired at least nine teachers Tuesday – via FedEx, union officials said.
Some of the Merrick Academy staffers who got the boot are chalking it up to a bitter contract dispute between the school and unionized teachers.
“If the board of the Merrick charter school is firing teachers because of union activity, then we’re going to take all legal action against them,” said United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew.
Teachers at the Queens Village school voted to unionize in 2008 but they haven’t reached a contract with the school’s board.
Gerald Karikari, chairman of Merrick’s Board of Trustees, would not say how many teachers were fired and denied the layoffs were retaliatory. “At the end of the year, every teacher is evaluated on the way they performed,” he said.
Kindergarten teacher Marjorie Berry, 60, one of the fired teachers, isn’t buying it. “I was upset, because I put my heart and soul into these children and into the school,” said Berry, who has taught at the school since it opened. “I just feel like I’ve been pushed aside like a piece of garbage.”
Federal prosecutors have subpoenaed documents from a politically connected architect who helped design Merrick’s school building in an ongoing corruption probe of several Queens politicians, including Merrick founders Senate President Malcolm Smith and U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/07/21/2010-07-21_disunion_as_9_teachers_fired.html#ixzz0uXP9mCsC 

Lisa, Thank you for putting him in his place! You always have the facts and you always back up every statement with the facts.

NYCT, oooh, unionized Links; let me know when I can sign a union card. I’m ready!

 More proof ( homework!)  that for-profit CMO Victory needs to get out of the eduprofit business and take the Baahstin Brahmin Duffy with them.
http://gothamschools.org/author/kim-gittleson/