Where's church/charter line?

Heidi Magi,  a parent in the UNC Charlotte area,  started digging into information about new charter schools as soon as the state gave preliminary approval in September.  She was delighted to find one scheduled to open at United Wesleyan Church,  near her neighborhood.

But as she read the application for United Community School and checked the web,  she found something puzzling.  Erika Hedgepeth,  named in the application as director of the charter school opening in 2014,  was also director of an existing school at the church,  which seems to be listed as both United Community School and Minds Engaged Christian Academy.  N.C. law allows private schools to apply for conversion to a charter,  which means they get public money instead of relying on tuition or private donations.  But the United Community charter application said it wasn't a conversion.

Magi emailed me wondering what was up.

"Reading the application and the very brief description of the private Christian school,  it looks like these two schools are very much the same school," she wrote.  "I guess I have a broader concern  --  if this ostensibly publicly funded, and therefore secular, school is this closely tied to a religious school, will UCS have a truly secular character?"

It was a great question. 

"Charter schools, as public schools, must meet the state statute which clearly says they are to be nonsectarian,"  says Joel Medley,  director of the N.C. Office of Charter Schools.  "Several charter schools have started in churches to attain a facility for the first year or so.  The religious iconography is to be removed (i.e. purple cloths put over crucifixes in Catholic parishes) in order to meet the tenets of the law.  Proselytizing is not allowed within the classroom."

Medley noted that both the current school run by Hedgepeth and her proposed charter school center on the Basic School method developed by the late educator Ernest Boyer.  It's a non-religious approach that focuses on parent-teacher partnership and seven core virtues,  and it's already in use at Community School of Davidson and Corvian Community School,  charters in northern Mecklenburg County.  The state's charter school advisory board noted the link to the church school and made sure United Community's board understood the need to be  "a separate and totally secular institution,"  Medley added.

I spoke with Hedgepeth last week,  while reporting a story on new charters.  She said she and her husband came across the Basic School model while looking for the best way to educate their own children.  She opened the small church-based school  --  it currently has 16 students, she said  --  while working toward a charter.  She hopes to have about 200 K-2 students in August,  eventually expanding to about 650 in K-8.  The school will incorporate her family's love of the arts,  she said,  with piano theory taught to all students.

I also looped back to Magi.  She had talked with Hedgepeth and liked what she heard.  Magi plans to enter her rising first-grade son in the lottery for United Community School and Pioneer Springs Community School,  a nearby private school that also uses the Basic School model and just got permission to convert to a charter.  

It's a textbook example of what parents need to do these days,  as choices and changes abound.  Magi read up on options,  delved into details,  made connections,  asked smart questions  --  and followed up with personal contact.  Her experiences,  and those of hundreds of other families out there making similar searches,  can help us all figure out how the rapidly changing world of public education is working.  Please share your questions,  comments and observations as the choice season progresses.