IDEA, one of the largest public charter school networks in San Antonio, plans to recruit students from local school districts as officials finalize plans to shutter schools amid drops in enrollment.
Just minutes from the Edgewood Independent School District’s central office and two campuses, Riyadh Al Obaidy, the principal of IDEA Monterrey Park College Prep, sat in a brightly lit conference room, where he said the students from the closing schools “deserve a chance.”
“I heard [SAISD is closing] 19 schools,” he told the San Antonio Report. “We will enroll all of them.”
Obaidy said that he and others at IDEA have already discussed a plan for those students as soon as the schools close.
Officials from IDEA Public Schools, the parent company that oversees Monterrey Park, did not comment on the specifics of any recruitment plans related to the closures, but said in a statement that the network faces obstacles to enrollment similar to other districts.
“Numerous factors can affect school enrollment including student achievement, daily attendance, staff retention, budget, or a range of socioeconomic challenges affecting families,” the statement said, adding that they “focus … community recruitment efforts in neighborhoods in proximity to our schools.”
Recruitment activities include attending community events, walking neighborhoods and hosting campus events, according to the charter operator.
IDEA has grown from a single campus to fifteen over the last decade and serves nearly 20,000 students. That expansion was made “solely to meet the changing needs of both students and the community.”
School closures possible
According to the Edgewood ISD, more than 1,000 students zoned for schools in the district currently attend IDEA schools.
A task force convened to redesign the district made note of the charter school’s proximity when formulating 11 possible actions that could save funding and align the district’s use of facilities with the lower enrollment.
One recommendation, which would involve closing Gonzalez Elementary School and moving students to Winston and Lyndon B. Johnson elementary schools, specifically cited the presence of charter schools near the receiving schools as a rationale for the move.
Another 10 scenarios were proposed last week during community meetings, where parents heard for the first time what could happen as soon as next year.
The other scenarios include:
- Closing Gardendale Early Learning and moving students to Winston Elementary, creating a Pre-K to 5th grade program.
- Closing and repurposing Wrenn Middle School and moving students to the Fine Arts Academy, creating a 6th to 12th-grade campus.
- Adding Pre-K to all schools. Only four out of 12 currently have Pre-K, with three stand-alone early childhood centers.
- Closing Cisneros Elementary and moving students to Las Palmas Elementary.
- Closing Stafford Early Childhood Campus and moving students to Cardenas, Gardendale and other elementary schools.
- Moving the central office to the Fine Arts Academy and repurposing the current central office building.
- Closing Loma Park Elementary School and moving students to Roosevelt and LBJ.
- Closing Winston Elementary and moving students to other elementary schools.
- Move first and second grade Gardendale students to Winston and turn it into a Pre-K program.
- Close Burleson and move students to the Fine Arts Academy.
But Olga Moucoulis, a spokeswoman for the Edgewood district, said that only a fraction of those recommendations will make it to the board for a vote next month.
“We’re not closing down eleven campuses,” she said. “The committee has made suggestions, and we are eagerly listening to the input that was given by our community.”
District staff will also provide feedback to the task force, which will meet again next week before providing an updated recommendation to the facilities and finance committee, which will then formulate a final proposal to present before the board in mid-November.
Charters blamed for cratering enrollment
Officials with both SAISD and EISD have pointed to charter schools as at least one of the factors that led to dramatic enrollment declines over the years and the resulting discussions to close campuses in the coming years.
Edgewood has 59 charter schools within five miles of its 16-square-mile enrollment boundary, compared to 30 in SAISD’s 79-square-mile boundary, according to district presentations.
With the growth of the charter schools in the region, Superintendent Eduardo Hernández said the district has had to increase marketing efforts to keep up.
“Charters have changed the game,” he said. “The bottom line is we have to do as well as they do.”
He also said charter schools often have higher turnover rates and less qualified teachers than traditional ISDs.
Charter competition drives innovation
SAISD has also been finding ways to compete with charter schools in recruitment and marketing efforts. Last year, for example, they created a TikTok account as part of their innovative approach to connecting directly with students.
In an email sent in March of 2022 obtained through an open records request, SAISD Chief Communications Officer Laura Short laid out the case to a district web administrator.
“Charter schools already are using the TikTok platform to assist their marketing and recruiting efforts,” she said.” They are directly targeting students and we need to be able to compete with that.”
Despite SAISD’s efforts, however, 10,000 students who would have attended SAISD schools enrolled in charter schools in the 2022-23 school year. Another three charter campuses will open in the coming year with 3,000 more seats.
Not all impacted campuses are on the closure list, however.
M.L. King Academy on the East Side, surrounded by charter schools, was only at 34% capacity last year, with many students zoned for the school opting to go elsewhere.
Under the draft plan, the school will receive students from two elementary schools that are expected to close.
Trustee Sarah Sorensen, who has been outspoken against the school closure process in SAISD, has pointed to the charter influence as a significant cause for the decline in enrollment that has plagued the district for years as she has traveled the district hearing from parents.
“Unfortunately, I’m not surprised, and I’m saddened to share that, even though it’s expected,” she said when asked about recruitment efforts in the wake of school closures. “As taxpayers, we’re subsidizing multiple schools and school districts that we don’t have the population to support.”
Unlike school boards, which are governed by elected school boards, charter schools are governed by unelected appointed boards of directors.
Because of that, Sorensen also said she is worried about charter schools’ more lax accountability, leaving parents with less of a voice.
“It’s a knock on democracy,” she said. “It’s an end of community control and transparency.”
“If our public school systems get weaker and our charter schools get stronger, we as a community, lose because we lose our … voice.”
