Coatesville district begins hearings on revoking Graystone charter

The Coatesville Area School District has begun hearings on whether to close the 430-student Graystone Academy Charter School, citing alleged violations involving academic and financial matters.

Graystone said financial reasons were behind the challenge.

Revocations of charters in Pennsylvania are a rarity. Since charters began operation in the state in 1997, only a handful have taken place. There are 145 charters in the state.

The Coatesville school board, which chartered Graystone, voted Tuesday night to consider whether to revoke the charter for the kindergarten-through-eighth-grade school.

The allegations - set out in a March 16 letter from Coatesville Board President J. Neil Campbell - state that Graystone had failed to carry out several promised academic programs and policies. The school was also accused of not meeting certain academic benchmarks and fiscal-management standards.

Graystone's board president - Jack Stollsteimer, the former Philadelphia Safe Schools Advocate - said the district wanted to close the school to save money.

School districts are required to pay the tuition of their students who attend charters. Coatesville, which is working to close a multimillion-dollar gap in next year's budget, sent about $4.6 million last year to Graystone in tuition fees.

Coatesville school Solicitor James E. Ellison denied that financial pressures played any role. He said the Graystone investigation began last fall when the school sent the district a letter saying it intended to seek a renewal of its charter, and the district followed up by conducting a review of the school.

Stollsteimer told the Coatesville board Tuesday that the Graystone community was "outraged by what you are attempting to do," adding, "We are going to fight your action."

Karen Stokes, a Graystone teacher and mother of three former pupils there, told the board that "parents need to be in control of their children's education and to have alternatives. . . . Graystone may not be the answer for all but it is the answer for many."

About 85 percent of the school's students are African American or Hispanic.

Hearings on the charter are scheduled to go on through the end of May, and it could take several months after that before the Coatesville board votes on whether to revoke Graystone's charter, Ellison said.

Brian H. Leinhauser, an attorney for Graystone, said that it was normal for schools to change their programs and academic policies "in the interest of better education for the students."

Graystone is not bound by statements about what it proposed to do that it made in its charter application, he said. It is only bound to carry out conditions set down in the charter, which do not include the matters referred to in the March 16 letter.

Stollsteimer and Leinhauser said that the district has failed to give Graystone information documenting the allegations it is making and has contacted some African American and Hispanic parents at the school seeking to win them back to the district in a way that some parents regarded as "intimidating."

Ellison said the district was following the proper procedures in holding the hearings and had contacted parents as part of a routine effort to inform them about improvements in district schools in recent years. "We have gotten no complaint of intimidation from parents," he said.