NC could close Raleigh charter school accused of ‘falsification’ of student records
UPDATE: State Board of Education has voted to sanction Torchlight Academy and give it 10 days to fix the problems in its special-education program.
North Carolina could close one of Raleigh’s oldest charter schools amid allegations that school officials falsified records of some special-education students.
Torchlight Academy is accused of “grossly negligent administrative oversight” of its exceptional children’s program, including “alteration and falsification” of records of some special-needs students. The State Board of Education will vote Thursday on whether to put Torchlight on probation, triggering a 30-day window to fix the various problems or risk revocation of its charter.
“It’s not that we expect everybody to be 100% perfect all the time,” Sherry Thomas, director of the state Department of Public Instruction’s exceptional children’s division, said at last week’s N.C. Charter Schools Advisory Board meeting. “But we do expect the cooperation and the response in a timely manner to fix those corrections.”
The recommendation for disciplinary action was made last week by the N.C. Charter Schools Advisory Board, a group of charter school leaders that advise the state board. Torchlight’s leaders asked the advisory board for grace given its history of helping to educate low-income and minority students since 1999.
Located near downtown Raleigh, Torchlight serves 600 mostly Black and Hispanic elementary and middle school students. It’s drawn praise over the years for its high academic growth results on state tests.
“There has been tremendous success that this school has experienced,” Donnie McQueen, the school’s executive director, told the advisory board. “We feel that the question should almost be in reverse.
“Why should this board be recommending revocation to a school like ours? We’re the only school in a Black neighborhood serving Black and brown children and successfully doing it.”
‘Alteration’ of student records
Charter schools are taxpayer-funded schools that are exempt from some of the rules that traditional public schools must follow. But the state’s 203 charter schools aren’t exempt from the federal Individual with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).
During a routine February 2020 compliance visit, DPI says it found “numerous deficiencies” in the services that are required under federal law for special-education students. The school was given until April 2021 to fix the problems, many of which DPI says are still unresolved.
In June 2021, Thomas said DPI discovered some records had been altered in the state’s computer system for exceptional children, called the Every Child Accountability and Tracking System (ECATS). She said dates and grades for old Individualized Education Programs were altered to make them appear to be current plans for some Torchlight students.
A student’s IEP is supposed to be updated annually, but only after school officials meet with parents.
Thomas said the changes were traced to Torchlight’s then exceptional children’s director, which resulted in DPI limiting her computer access. The exceptional children’s director at the time is the daughter of Donnie McQueen and Cynthia McQueen, Torchlight’s principal.
Cynthia McQueen said the problems were due to her daughter’s lack of familiarity with the computer system. Her daughter now has a different position at the school.
Dustin Squibb, who is Torchlight’s new exceptional children’s director, said the record changes were the result of user error and were not malicious.
Unannounced ‘raid’ on school
Thomas said the altered records led DPI to conduct an unannounced visit to Torchlight in September 2021 that discovered more issues. Other reasons the advisory board gives for recommending putting Torchlight on probation include:
▪ ”Failure to properly implement the Individualized Education Program process as mandated by the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act.”
▪ ”Inability and/or failure to provide access by NCDPI EC staff to EC student and finance records when requested.”
▪ ”Lack of qualified staff in the EC program.”
▪ “Falsely reporting staff’s compliance with Every Child Accountability and Tracking System (ECATS) training.”
▪ ”Failure to provide all documentation requested by DPI’s EC Division.”
Donnie McQueen said it was disrespectful of DPI to show up unannounced given how the school has served students for more than 20 years.
“We have earned the respect,” McQueen told the advisory board. “That’s a common respect for somebody to pick up the phone, send an email asking how can we help now.
“I’m going to characterize it as I saw it: A raid to come in and find things that are wrong.”
Donnie McQueen’s exchange with the advisory board grew heated at times.
Asking for COVID grace
During last week’s advisory board hearing, Torchlight leaders repeatedly cited how hard it was for them to address the problems raised by DPI while working through the coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s two years when everybody was in a panic because nobody knew what to do when COVID hit us,” Pamela Banks Lee, chairwoman of Torchlight’s board of directors, told the advisory board. “Now when COVID hits us, it’s a little bit different than when it hits everybody else and I need for you to keep that in mind.”
In its response to DPI, Torchlight noted how the initial compliance visit came just a month before Gov. Roy Cooper declared a state of emergency that led to all schools being closed for in-person instruction.
“We were trying to feed 600 children who didn’t have food when they were at home,” Cynthia McQueen said. “We were trying to make sure they received Chromebooks.
“We were trying to make sure that they had access to internet so we were spending our time with that and we also felt that the children were being serviced. If someone says they weren’t being serviced, that is not true.”
Bruce Friend, vice chairman of the advisory board, said Torchlight can’t blame the pandemic for the problems in the exceptional children’s program.
“The pandemic didn’t cause you to miss deadlines when other schools in the state met them,” Friend said. “The pandemic didn’t create a situation where IEP files are being altered.
“It was a challenging time for 2,600 public schools in the state and somehow they also stayed in compliance.”
This story was originally published December 15, 2021 at 8:30 AM.
