A Hanover charter school will remain on probation for the upcoming school year despite addressing several shortcomings the Anne Arundel school system identified.
The Anne Arundel Board of Education agreed with Superintendent Kevin Maxwell?s recommendation on the fate of Chesapeake Science Point Charter School, the county?s only charter school.
“I think we?re doing everything we can to help,” board President Tricia Johnson said.
The charter school should remain on probation because it required a “substantial amount of help” in fixing its deficiencies, Maxwell said.
The school?s governing board also had “consistently demonstrated a lack of capacity to operate the school with the degree of autonomy which they desire,” he said.
Johnson compared the situation with the charter school to the school system?s response to help struggling Annapolis High School after the school repeatedly failed to meet reading and math targets on the Maryland School Assessment.
In January, Maxwell gave the charter school a month to correct several issues. The school countered by hiring two part-time certified special education teachers and delaying the expansion of its high school program to remain a middle school with 198 students.
Eugene Peterson, a Board of Education member, agreed probation was still necessary but expressed his desire to see a self-supportive school that didn?t need so much help from the school system.
“We share those concerns, and that it?s only when we get to crunch time, we manage to get through these critical areas,” Maxwell said about the charter?s heavy reliance on the school system to meet its needs.
Peterson also asked the superintendent for documentation on the amount of man-hours spent assisting the school.
