SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Utah schools that hire companies to lure students to their online programs have little to do with those students once parents sign them up, according to a new audit from the Utah State Office of Education.
The schools, mostly charter schools but a few public ones, often pass off oversight of students’ progress and attendance to those recruiting companies, according to the 52-page audit.
The 2,550 students currently enrolled in such programs are “ghost students,” said state Sen. Deidre Henderson, R-Spanish Fork. Their designated schools “don’t manage them. They don’t interact with them,” she said.
School officials have also failed to make sure the online teachers are licensed in Utah and have cleared background checks. Nor have they verified that the classes comply with statewide core-curriculum standards, the audit says. The audit looked at three public schools and eight charters statewide.
The recruiting companies offer parents allowances for enrolling students, which can range from around $300 to $800. It means they “essentially bribe students,” said Henderson, who serves on the board of virtual charter school Mountain Heights.
The cash allowances don’t break any rules, said Tim Beagley, chairman of the Utah State Charter School Board, but don’t seem to be a fair practice.
For charters, Beagley said, receiving fewer students than planned could be detrimental. “I believe these two companies took advantage of that.”
But that’s not the case, say Matthew Bowman, founder of My Tech High Inc. and John Thorn, president of Harmony Educational Services, the Utah-based recruiting companies. They offer important services to students and welcome clearer policies, they said.
About $10.5 million in state money is travelling through schools this year and on to those companies, reports the Salt Lake Tribune (https://bit.ly/1kbuOJW).
Bowman said the allowances for parents help get the students the curriculum and technology they need. Thorn wrote in an email that the audit identifies areas that the state has needed to address for some time.
David Thomas, vice chairman of the Utah State Board of Education, says the audit is a “wake-up call” for the state to clearly spell out the rules for schools.
At least eight charter schools will receive warning letters from the state charter school office, said Marlies Burns, who oversees charters. If they don’t fix the problems, their charters could be pulled, she said.
Provo District’s eSchool, which contracts with My Tech and Harmony, has also been told to make changes.
Among the audit’s other findings: At least one school and its contractor are getting state money for teaching home-school courses, which do not qualify for funding. Schools also did not follow state laws requiring competitive bidding, the audit found, which the state education office must report to the attorney general’s office for investigation.
Some charters are providing online classes when their charters don’t explicitly allow for it.
Enrollment at eSchool took off when it contracted with the outside companies. The online programs bring in over half of the school’s 1,200 students, said Megan Dunnigan, school coordinator.
Some parents and students, “for whatever reason, they feel more comfortable having this advocate, this go-between,” she said.
Dunnigan said the majority of such students were formerly home-schooled.
The Provo school has begun making the changes called for in the audit, Dunnigan said.
In Utah, 15 out of 90 charter schools and 23 of the state’s 41 school districts offer the online or long-distance programs.
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Information from: The Salt Lake Tribune, https://www.sltrib.com
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