The Golden State Schools' Report Lays Out Excessive Spending And Overpayments To Group Of Charter Schools

1. Superintendent of Instruction for the California schools, Jack O'Connell, initiated an audit more than a year earlier into the fiscal issues of the Alternatives for Youth and Opportunities for Learning (OYO) schools. The OYO is a chain of independent research study charter schools within the California schools system, which are privately run however funded by the state. The OYO California schools serve trainees who have dropped out of the standard high schools. They presently have about 15,000 trainees in 40 store areas throughout the state. These California schools trainees do the majority of their work at house, meeting with teachers twice a week. According to state records, trainee achievement test and high school exit examination ratings are above average, as compared to other alternative high schools within the California schools system. According to a Los Angeles Times post of August 10th, only 11 percent of OYO students finished throughout the 2003-2004 academic year. The rest of students that left school that year either dropped out, were expelled, or moved to other schools. The California schools' audit was carried out by the Financial Crisis and Management Assistance Team, who concluded their analysis and presented their findings in a report that was released in August 2006. The audit points out accounting flaws, overpayments by the state, conflicts of interest, nepotism, extreme compensation, and mixing personal service concerns with public schools. The OYO was founded and still operated by John and Joan Hall, previous instructors from Hollywood High School. They have completely worked together with the California schools' audit, however disagreement most of the findings. Some examples from the audit report are: • Accounting Flaws and Overpayments. The Halls count each of their instructors as 1.92 full-time positions. Their representative, Stevan Allen, stated that this is a typical practice for charter schools in the California schools system and is a genuine technique for compensating school personnel for longer days and year-round schedules. California schools superintendent O'Connell believes teachers ought to be counted only as one full-time position each. The auditors disagreed, pointing out that standard California schools teachers invest much less time working each year than those at OYO. However, the auditors believed the 1.92 quantity is pumped up. This example, alone, accounts for majority of the $57 million overpayment. Additionally, the report noted several questionable costs. One example of unrestrained costs, provided by the Times was an $18,000 staff celebration held at Disneyland. Allen protected that event as an attempt at relationship structure between team member, who are spread across the state. He kept in mind that the costs was less than $50 per employee. • Disputes of Interest and Mixing Private Business with Public Schools. Besides the charter schools, the Halls own and run several personal companies that sell products and services to schools. The Times noted that the Options in OYO was the nonprofit part of the setup, with the Opportunities part being for-profit. The audit calls this practice and setup into concern. • Excessive Payment. The audit likewise questions the combined wages for the Halls, which is $600,000 annually. The report mentions that it might be excessive for the amount of time the couple in fact works. • Nepotism. The Halls created a different charity with $10.8 million of the California schools' funding, called Pathways in Education. The charity is run by their daughter, Jamie Hall. Little money has been spent toward education so far. The Halls compete that they car donation youtube previously had requested guidance on their operation from the California schools sometimes, however never ever received any action. Hence, they attempted to follow California

2. schools requirements as best they could with their understanding of the policies. Even O'Connell yielded that none of the pointed out practices are unlawful. The audit advises the California schools ought to attempt to recover the $57 million in overpayment from the OYO. O'Connell has actually sent out the report to the state's chief law officer's workplace for review and any necessary action.