Sierra Crest Academy seeks charter renewal

Board members of Minden-based Sierra Crest Academy have decided to pursue renewal of the school's charter against the recommendation of their chief administrator.

Principal David Brackett said Friday that about three dozen parents attended the March 10 meeting when the school's governing board voted 4-0 for renewal. Consequently, he said, the renewal application must be filed with the school's sponsor, Douglas County School District, by March 28. The charter officially expires in June.

"The administration did not recommend renewal," said Brackett. "Although the decision was difficult, it was the right decision based on analysis of the entire situation."

Brackett said the county's only public charter school began in 2004 and since has struggled with compliance issues. Unfortunately, he said, the school and its roughly 70 seventh-12th-grade students cannot switch to state sponsorship, as that requires a clean track record of compliance for three years.

Brackett said the school district is seeking revocation of the charter.

"After receiving a letter of revocation, the applicant will have 30 days to address all concerns in the letter, then it will go in front of the Douglas County School Board," Brackett said.

Brackett said he personally will not carry out the renewal application, but rather a committee comprised of governing board members and parents.

When asked if he'd stay on if the charter is renewed, Brackett said, "No, not in its current state."

Brackett said he was definitely in the minority at the board meeting.

"I laid out things in the original charter that we don't do," he said.

For example, the charter requires a 19-day pre-service institution for teachers every year, something Brackett said the school hasn't done. He said the charter also prohibits an administrator position, mandating instead a teacher leadership council, which Brackett's position violates.

"It's enough to substantiate revocation," he said. "In 30 days, how do you go back and address what were in the original charter? Maybe a lot of things you can, but some you just can't."

"It was a tough recommendation," he said. "I thought a lot about it. There were a lot of arguments that there is a need for a school like ours, and there is. The argument was made that we provide a tremendous service to our kids, and we do. The problem is that the metrics we are measured by don't take that into consideration."

Brackett used the metaphor of a paper cut to illustrate the school's dilemma.

"If you get 10 paper cuts, you're all right. If you get 100 paper cuts, you're all right. If you get 1,000 paper cuts, you're miserable. If you get 10,000, you bleed out," he said. "That's more or less what's happened."

Brackett said in all honesty, he thinks the best thing for his students would be to stay at Sierra Crest.

"In my professional opinion, I think the kids would be better off here," he said. "But the school as a system would be disservicing them. If we could be doing it better, doing it cleaner, then we would have a more compelling argument. It's simply not enough."

Brackett said it's hard to pinpoint who is responsible for the school's shortcomings.

"I wish I were solely responsible," he said. "Then it would be real easy to address the issue. I wish it were the board, then we could single out the problem and rebuild the board. I wish it were the staff, but it's not. Each part of the school, when taken on itself individually, is OK, but the aggregate is not. We've had enough problems in enough areas to where it eventually overtook us."

Parents of students at Sierra Crest Academy are sticking up for Douglas County's only public charter school.

"Put simply, there are children who do not do as well in traditional educational environments, and for those children, this school offers an opportunity to be successful," parent Renee Sweeney said Monday.

Sweeney's son Shaun is a freshman at the Minden-based school, which over the years has prided itself on independent, project-based learning. Sponsored by the Douglas County School District, the school's charter was enacted in 2004 and expires in June.

Sweeney and dozens of parents are now determined to keep the school open. To do so, a charter renewal application would have to be filed with the district by March 28, and supporters would have to convince the district not to revoke the charter.

"We have very committed parents," Sweeney said. "We're simply saying our students need an alternative."

Sweeney said she and other parents want to make their case to the Douglas County School Board.

"We are aware of the image that was presented at the last meeting," she said. "The school board wasn't given the complete, accurate picture, both of what the school has accomplished and what it is capable of."

In February, school board members voted 6-1, with Karen Chessell voting nay, to approve a resolution stating the district will no longer sponsor charter schools. Although board members said they would support the concept of charter schools in the future, they voted to refer all future sponsorship requests to the Nevada Department of Education.

"It's not a fight, but a persuasion," Sweeney said of making her case. "While we don't have the best odds, if we present the right material, we can succeed. The goal is to get the school at 100 percent compliance as soon as possible, and then move to state sponsorship. That's what the district wants."

On Monday, Sierra Crest board member Erik Papp agreed with Sweeney on the educational importance of a charter school in the Valley.

"From an idealistic point of view, it seems very important to have an option, to have a choice, to have something outside the box for those kids who don't succeed in the normal environment," Papp said. "And we have a lot of those kids."

Papp said parents have told him "one story after another" about their children succeeding at Sierra Crest.

"At this point, it's fair to assume that our board is representing parents," he said.

And while supporters of the school figure out "the mechanics" of the renewal application process, Papp acknowledged the difficulty of moving forward without the support of the greater community.

"No one has the impression that we can move forward without some support from the district," he said.

Like Sweeney, Papp hopes the school can correct its compliance issues and then move to state sponsorship as soon as possible.