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Falcon Board Gives Charter School OK

Posted on: Wednesday, 12 October 2005, 03:00 CDT

By BRIAN NEWSOME THE GAZETTE

The region's first charter school designed to accommodate growth and sell homes rather than fill an educational niche has been approved in Falcon School District 49.

The D-49 board voted 4-1 Thursday night to grant the school a charter despite some members' doubts it would ease crowding in the fastgrowing district east of Powers Boulevard.

Construction of the Banning Lewis Ranch Academy, a kindergarten- through-eighth-grade school proposed for up to 675 children in the soon-to-be-developed Banning-Lewis Ranch subdivision, could begin as early as next month. Classes could begin next fall, and the school is pre-enrolling students.

It will precede nearly 1,200 new homes expected by 2007, and the developer will use the school partly to market the subdivision and keep from overburdening existing schools.

Charter schools are public schools that receive money from the state. They are run by parents, teachers or community members and operate under a contract with a local school district or the state Charter School Institute.

That's why Judy Holman, board vice president, voted no. "It wasn't a grass-roots effort, and that's what charter schools are supposed to be," she said.

The idea of the school started with Banning-Lewis developer, Banning Lewis Ranch Management Company LLC, because it was worried that homebuyers wouldn't want their children to attend class in portable buildings.

The school as proposed would be run by Mosaica Education Inc., a for-profit company.

Mosaica -- and a curriculum that focuses largely on the basics -- has a strong track record nationwide, said Terry Gogerty, director of business management. Building neighborhood charter schools in fast-growing areas has proved successful elsewhere and should also work here, Gogerty said Friday.

In Brighton School District 27J, a Denver area district with a size and growth rate similar to D-49's, Gogerty helped open three charter schools. About 90 percent of the students at those schools live in those neighborhoods, he said.

He expects a similar percentage of the school's students to live in the Banning-Lewis neighborhood.

Two D-49 board members who voted for the new school aren't convinced.

Board President Dave Martin and member Paul Bryant said they saw no reason to deny the charter school, but they are skeptical how far it will go toward accommodating new families in Banning-Lewis or other D-49 students.

Charter schools offer an alternative to traditional public school curriculums, and just how many people will choose it -- and where those people will come from -- is unclear, they said Friday. Martin said the school could draw mostly outof-district students, while Banning-Lewis students go to other D-49 schools.

By contrast, Bryant wondered if enough people would be interested in the school or if it would sit half-empty.

For years, D-49 schools have absorbed much of the region's growth as families move to a swell of new subdivisions in northeast Colorado Springs and the Falcon area.

Schools across the district are crowded, and the district is asking voters in November for up to $156 million in additional taxes during the next 25 years to build more schools and pay interest on the debt.

This year, developers, concerned about home values if crowding causes the district's reputation to decline, decided to contribute $1,500 per new home. Banning-Lewis Ranch will contribute the fee on new homes in addition to building the charter school.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0198 or bnewsome@gazette.com

For more information or to pre-enroll at the Banning Lewis Ranch Academy, visit www.blracademy.org.

Source: Gazette, The; Colorado Springs, Colo.

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