Red River Charter withdraws application for BESE approval

Wants to work with Avoyelles School Board to open charter school

In a “show of good faith” in hopes of working with the Avoyelles Parish School Board, officials of the proposed Red River Charter Academy withdrew the school’s application prior to this past Tuesday’s Board of Elementary & Secondary Education meeting.

“We have been asked repeatedly by the state to work with the local school district, and we have always wanted to do that,” RRCA Board President Jessica Couvillion said. “I reached out to Superintendent Blaine Dauzat a few weeks ago to see if there was a chance to resolve our differences and work together. He said there is.

“In a show of good faith, the Red River Charter board members decided to withdraw the application before BESE to give us an opportunity to work with the local district,” Couvillion added.

Avoyelles Parish School Board President Chris LaCour said the board has agreed to “have discussions” -- not negotiations -- with RRCA officials to “find common ground and move forward with what is best for the education of children in Avoyelles Parish.”

He said the federal desegregation order prohibits the School Board from negotiating to open a new school without court approval.

“We said we would have discussions to see what they are looking for and what we are looking for,” LaCour said. “This is very preliminary, and they (RRCA officials) knew that when they agreed to withdraw their application before BESE.”

LaCour said most of the School Board members were in favor of conducting discussions with RRCA board members, but a few were opposed.

‘FIND COMMON GROUND'

“RRCA made a good faith gesture by withdrawing their application and we will make a good faith effort to find common ground to benefit the children of this parish,” he added.

Couvillion said RRCA officials “don’t believe this school would have had a negative effect on desegregation in the parish schools, but we realize deseg is a big deal and there are concerns about the effect Red River might have on the parish being declared unitary.”

Even though Allen Holmes, the plaintiff in the desegregation suit, supports the creation of the new middle/high school, Couvillion said there was a concern “that the federal judge would look unfavorably on the application and make the parish’s problem bigger.

“That is blood we did not want on our hands,” she continued, “especially when the school district is to be declared a unitary school system in May 2018. We did not want anyone pointing fingers at us, saying, ‘You just couldn’t wait another eight months, could you?’”

Couvillion said that had BESE approved the charter application and U.S. District Judge Dee Drell ruled the school would not adversely affect desegregation of the public schools, “we realistically would probably not have been able to open until the 2019-20 school year anyway. We might possibly have been able to open in 2018-19 in a temporary site, but probably not.”

If the School Board’s promised “discussion” is merely a delaying tactic resulting in another refusal of the charter application, Red River will once again go to BESE to request state approval to operate an independent public charter school. The school would be grades 6-8 the first year, adding a high school grade each year until it is a 6-12 high school. Couvillion said the school would open in 2019-20 if approved by BESE, even if it had to start in temporary classrooms while a permanent site was acquired and prepared.

RRCA officials are currently looking at two possible sites for the proposed school -- the privately owned former Garan plant in Marksville and the closed Mansura Middle/High School buildings, still owned by the School Board.

A black cloud hanging over the proposed new school is the issue of state funding for BESE-approved charter schools. An appeals court has ruled funding of BESE-approved charter schools to be unconstitutional. The state Supreme Court is reviewing the case to determine whether to uphold or overturn that ruling. State funding of local school board-approved charter schools is not in question.

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