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 Watonga Republican
OKLAHOMA
Switching to Charter Allows
Epic to Run Rural Districts
May
08
2019
Page By Jennifer Palmer
B004 Oklahoma Watch
www.OklahomaWatch.org
To save his financially
Clip imperiled school district,
resized Panola Superintendent Brad
Corcoran in 2017 pitched a
25% plan to convert the traditional
public district into a charter
school.
In becoming a charter,
Panola Public Schools would
turn over its management to
a company affiliated with
Epic Charter Schools, the
largest online school in the
state. The school board
agreed.
The Epic-related firm con-
tributed $100,000 toward
Panola’s debt as part of the
agreement. That company
manages the small district for
a more than 10 percent cut of
its funding. Panola’s high
school students now have the
option to attend most classes
online from home.
The deal was unprecedent-
ed. Not only was it one of the
first conversions-to-charter
in the state, it allowed Epic’s
company to operate a school
and gain many benefits
denied other charter schools:
It could tap into and spend
local property tax revenue to
cover costs of student trans-
portation, school buildings
and sports facilities, like tra-
ditional school districts.
And Epic didn’t stop at
Panola.
Leaders at Norwood,
another small district nearly
100 miles north of Panola in
the town of Hulbert, say Epic
came to them last year with a
nearly identical proposal to
convert the school to a char-
ter managed by Epic. Epic
planned to consolidate the
Norwood and Panola dis-
tricts, said Norwood Board
President Danny Shoemaker.
But in December, the
Norwood board rebuffed the
proposal.
“It (the Epic proposal)
would not benefit our stu-
dents, and we’re there for the
kids,” Shoemaker said,
adding he was grateful their
situation wasn’t as dire as
Panola’s. He questioned
Epic’s motives, suggesting
they were more about profit-
ing through its management
affiliate. “This was more to
line somebody’s pockets,” he
said.
Epic officials have denied
they put profits over educa-
tion quality and say their
school’s rapid growth is
proof that their online and
blended models meet fami-
lies’ needs. Shelly Hickman, a
spokeswoman for Epic, said
Panola and Norwood are
examples of how Epic tries
to make different learning
models work together to
serve all students.
But as a business, Epic
continues to explore ways of
accelerating its growth.
Combined, its own two
schools — Epic virtual and
Epic Blended in Oklahoma
City and Tulsa — enrolled at
least 23,000 students this
year. A fourth blended center
is expected to open this fall
near Rose State College in
Midwest City. To attend,
Epic students have to live in
the same county as a blended
center, and the Panola school
is their first foray into rural
Oklahoma.
Epic’s school in California
is also expanding, now
enrolling students from five
of the state’s most populous
counties. And an Epic-relat-
ed company is in contract
negotiations with Pulaski
County Schools in Arkansas.
In the midst of that growth,
Epic has drawn more scruti-
ny from lawmakers, the pub-
lic and state and federal
Property of OPS News Tracker and members of the Oklahoma Press Association.
investigators, the
World reported.
Tulsa
Purpose of Law
One state legislator says
the law permitting the
arrangement in Panola was
never intended to be used by
a virtual school.
A 2016 change to the
Oklahoma Charter School
Act allows a traditional
school district to convert to a
charter. The measure specifi-
cally states, “A conversion
school shall retain the charac-
teristics of a traditional public
school.”
Sen. Ron Sharp, R-
Shawnee, said when the bill
was considered in the
Legislature, lawmakers didn’t
discuss a conversion school
being anything other than a
brick-and-mortar school with
regularly scheduled classes.
“This is Epic One-on-One
(the statewide virtual school)
at home under the pretense of
a brick-and-mortar conver-
sion charter district,” he said.
Some parents like the
changes. Jessica Manning,
who lives in Wilburton, near
Panola, sends her four chil-
dren to the school. “At first,
people had a mindset that our
kids were going to be staring
at a computer all day,” she
said. “Elementary hasn’t
changed. High school has
more computer work, but
they still have book work.”
For the Panola deal, Epic
used a limited liability com-
pany it formed in 2015 called
Community Strategies-CA.
Community Strategies-CA is
a nonprofit LLC, while the
similarly named Community
Strategies Inc. is the tax-
exempt nonprofit that is the
legal name for Epic Charter
Schools.
Community Strategies-CA
now receives all revenue for
Panola, including local prop-
erty taxes, state aid and feder-
al funding.
There is just one other con-
version school in the state:
Millwood Elementary in
Oklahoma City, which con-
verted in May 2017, around
the time Panola did.
Millwood is still managed by
the local school board.
Concerns About Epic
Epic’s rapid rise and push
into school district manage-
ment has many traditional
school leaders wondering
what’s next.
Pam Deering, executive
director of the Cooperative
Council for Oklahoma School
Administrators, said the
state’s lack of investment in
public education over the last
decade has contributed to
many educators’ frustration
with Epic.
“There is a concern, yes,
that someone could swoop in
and offer a huge chunk of
change to take over a
school,” Deering said. “We
just have to educate our
(local school) boards and
superintendents and commu-
nities that a teacher in the
classroom is where education
needs to be, and virtual can
be a part of that if it’s handled
right.”
Trice Butler, superinten-
dent of Wilburton Public
Schools, which neighbors
Panola, said she is concerned
that Epic is looking to repli-
cate what it’s done in Panola
in other districts.
Butler said her primary
concern is her belief that stu-
dents at Epic are receiving a
subpar education. She cited
Epic’s low high school gradu-
ation rates and high numbers
of students leaving Epic and
returning to traditional
schools with academic credit
insufficient for the time they
were enrolled. (Epic main-
tains that some students
come to them behind in cred-
its and the school helps them
catch up.)
Epic’s presence in Panola
has also raised concerns
about aggressive attempts to
attract students and teachers
from surrounding school dis-
tricts even in the middle of
the academic year.
Panola spent $650 for
postcards, and at least some
were sent to addresses in
nearby Wilburton school dis-
trict, promising a customized
education for students and
touting the school’s “double-
digit academic growth.”
Butler called this “predato-
ry marketing” and said the
statements made on the post-
card are misleading.
Panola elementary students
did post positive academic
growth on the latest school
report cards, with 80 percent
of students improving
between 2016-17 and 2017-
18. But only 27 percent of
those students scored on
grade level, compared with
57 percent in Wilburton and
51 percent statewide.
Changes at School
Panola is so small that
teachers handle at least two
grades apiece. It has a Class
B basketball team, but there’s
no art, physical education or
music, parents say. Epic’s
taking over management of
the school didn’t change that.
But other aspects have
changed. Teachers can work
part-time at Panola and part-
time at Epic or another
school. Superintendent
Corcoran, for example,
earned nearly $87,000 in
2018, but only $4,500 was
for his role at Panola; he is
actually a full-time Epic
employee.
And Epic uses Panola as a
hub for giving standardized
tests to its statewide virtual
school students in the area.
In the Norwood district,
which rejected Epic’s man-
agement proposal, Epic offi-
cials deny that they were the
ones who approached district
leaders.
“Norwood reached out
after hearing how we were
able to financially and aca-
demically turn around
Panola,” said Hickman, the
Epic spokeswoman.
Shoemaker, the Norwood
board president, said the
company offered laptops for
students and a stipend for
internet services, but they
pitched combining the local
school board with Panola’s,
which would have given each
community fewer seats at the
table.
After Norwood’s school
board unanimously rejected
the agreement Dec. 13, the
district’s superintendent Ken
Bridges, who Shoemaker said
supported the plan, resigned,
after serving six months in
the position. Bridges could
not be reached for comment.
Hope and Uncertainty
Panola and Epic officials
declined several requests by
Oklahoma Watch to tour
Panola school and speak to
students and staff.
School board president
Randy Conley provided a
written statement saying par-
ents and faculty are grateful
for the school’s partnership
with Epic, which he said has
been beneficial both finan-
cially and academically.
“Today, our school
finances are sound and we
have improved (from F) to an
overall grade of ‘C’ from the
state,” he said. The letter
grade is for Panola
Elementary, a preK-8 school.
The financial uncertainty in
Panola, and the transition to
Epic, have caused many stu-
dents to leave. Panola’s
enrollment is down 35 per-
cent from 2014, according to
state data. It slipped by 2.7
percent, or three students,
from 2017 to 2018.
Still, Conley says, “If it
wasn’t for Epic, Panola
school would no longer exist
… We hope that more of the
students that left Panola for
Wilburton and surrounding
districts during our uncertain
time return to us.”
Oklahoma Watch is a non-
profit, nonpartisan media
organization that produces
in-depth and investigative
journalism on a range of
public-policy issues facing
the state. For more
Oklahoma Watch content, go
to www.oklahomawatch.org.