UNIVERSITY PUBLIC SCHOOL

Charter Renewal

Submitted: June 2009

For a term of July 1, 2009 – June 30, 2014

TABLE OF CONTENTS

AFFIRMATIONS/ASSURANCES

I. Introduction

Founding Group

Intent of the Charters Schools Act

II. Educational Philosophy and Program

The School’s Mission

Target Population

What it Means to be an Educated Person in the 21st Century

How Learning Best Occurs

III. Measurable Pupil Outcomes

Student Outcomes

Methods to Assess Pupil Progress Toward Meeting Outcomes

Assessment Modifications and Accommodations

School-wide Outcomes and Methods of Measurement

Use and Reporting of Data

IV. Governance Structure

Not-for-profit Public Benefit Corporation

Board of Directors

Board of Directors Membership

Board Duties

Advisory School Council

Additional Opportunities for Parent Involvement

Addressing Parent Concerns and Complaints

V. Human Resources

Qualifications of School Employees Overall

Principal Qualifications

Office Manager Qualifications

Teacher Qualifications

Teacher Hiring

Professional Development

Staff Evaluation

Compensation

Retirement Benefits

Employee Representation

District Employee Return Rights

Health and Safety Procedures

Dispute Resolution Procedures

VI. STUDENT ADMISSIONS, ATTENDANCE, AND SUSPENSION / EXPULSION POLICIES

Student Admissions Policies and Procedure

Racial & Ethnic Balance

Public School Attendance Alternatives

Suspension and Expulsion Procedures

VII. Reporting and Accountability

Budgets and Cash Flow

Financial Reporting

Insurance

Administrative Services

Facilities

Independent Fiscal Audit

Direct Funding

District Fee for Oversight

Closure Procedures

VIII. Impact on Charter Authorizer

IX. Miscellaneous charter-Related Issues

Term of Charter Petition

Interpreting the Charter

Revoking the Charter

AFFIRMATIONS/ASSURANCES

As the authorized lead petitioner, I, Alex Hernandez, hereby certify that the information submitted in this application for renewal for a California public charter school, named University Public School, located within the boundaries of the Lodi Unified School District, is true to the best of my knowledge and belief; I also certify that this petition does not constitute the conversion of a private school to the status of a public charter school; and further, I understand that if awarded a renewal of the charter, the Charter School:

  • Shall meet all statewide standards and conduct the student assessments required, pursuant to Education Code Section 60605, and any other statewide standards authorized in statute, or student assessments applicable to students in non-charter public schools.
  • Shall be deemed the exclusive public school employer of the employees of the CharterSchool for purposes of the Educational Employment Relations Act.
  • Shall be non-sectarian in its programs, admissions policies, employment practices, and all other operations.
  • Shall not charge tuition.
  • Shall admit all students who wish to attend the Charter School, and who submit a timely application, unless the Charter School receives a greater number of applications than there are spaces for students, in which case admission, except for existing students of the School, shall be determined through a public random drawing process. Admission to the CharterSchool shall not be determined by the place of residence of the child or his or her parents within the state.
  • Shall not discriminate on the basis of the characteristics listed in Section 220 (actual or perceived disability, gender, nationality, race or ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or any other characteristic that is contained in the definition of hate crimes set forth in Section 422.55 of the Penal Code or association with an individual who has any of the aforementioned characteristics).
  • Shall adhere to all provisions of federal law related to students with disabilities including, but not limited to, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Improvement Act of 2004.
  • Shall meet all requirements for employment set forth in applicable provisions of law, including, but not limited to credentials, as necessary.
  • Shall ensure that teachers in the Charter School hold a Commission on Teacher Credentialing certificate, permit, or other document equivalent to that which a teacher in other public schools are required to hold. As allowed by statute, flexibility will be given to non-core, non-college preparatory teachers.
  • Shall at all times maintain all necessary and appropriate insurance coverage.
  • Shall, for each fiscal year, offer at a minimum, the number of minutes of instruction per grade level as required by Education Code Section 47612.5(a)(1)(A)-(D)
  • Shall notify the superintendent of the school district of the pupils last known address within 30 days if a pupil is expelled or leaves the charter school without graduating or completing the school year for any reason, providing the pupil’s last known address within 30 days, and shall, upon request, provide that school district with a copy of the cumulative record of the pupil, including a transcript of grades or report card and health information.
  • Will follow any and all other federal, state, and local laws and regulations that apply to the CharterSchool including but not limited to:
  • Shall maintain accurate and contemporaneous written records that document all pupil attendance and make these records available for audit and inspection.
  • Shall on a regular basis consult with its parents and teachers regarding the CharterSchool's education programs.
  • Shall comply with any jurisdictional limitations to locations of its facilities.
  • Shall comply with all laws establishing the minimum and maximum age for public school enrollment.
  • Shall comply with all applicable portions of the No Child Left Behind Act.
  • Shall comply with the Public Records Act.
  • Shall comply with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
  • Shall comply with the Ralph M. Brown Act.
  • Shall meet or exceed the legally required minimum of school days

.

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Lead Petitioner, Alex HernandezDate:

I. Introduction

Aspire Public Schools (“Aspire”) wishes to continue to operate University Public Schoolas a public charter school, (“School” or “CharterSchool”) to prepare students for college, work, and citizenship. Our focus is on a student population that is currently under-served and under-represented in college.

Founding Group

Aspire Public Schools, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit public benefit corporation, is a pioneer and leader in California public education. Since its founding in 1998, Aspire has opened 21 high-quality, small, college-preparatory campuses throughout California, and has demonstrated the important role of charter schools in providing educational opportunities for California’s diverse youth. Its schools have had consistently strong academic results; parents and teachers are highly satisfied; and the organization was named by Fast Company magazine as one of the top 20 social entrepreneurial organization in the country in four of the last five years. Aspire is widely regarded as one of the leading not-for-profit charter management organizations in the country.

 See AppendixIa for more information on Aspire’s results to date.

Intent of the Charters Schools Act

The Charter Schools Act of 1992 states that:

It is the intent of the Legislature…to provide opportunities for teachers, parents, pupils, and community members to establish and maintain schools that operate independently from the existing school district structure, as a method to accomplish all of the following:

a)Improve pupil learning.

b)Increase learning opportunities for all pupils, with special emphasis on expanded learning experiences for pupils who are identified as academically low achieving.

c)Encourage the use of different and innovative teaching methods.

d)Create new professional opportunities for teachers, including the opportunity to be responsible for the learning program at the school site.

e)Provide parents and pupils with expanded choices in the types of educational opportunities that are available within the public school system.

f)Hold the schools established under this part accountable for meeting measurable pupil outcomes, and provide the schools with a method to change from rule-based to performance-based accountability systems.

g)Provide vigorous competition within the public school system to stimulate continual improvements in all public schools.

- California Education Code Section 47601

Charter Renewal Petition – University Public School

II. Educational Philosophy and Program

Governing Law:

A description of the educational program of the school, designed, among other things, to identify those whom the school is attempting to educate, what it means to be an “educated person” in the 21st century, and how learning best occurs. The goals identified in that program shall include the objective of enabling pupils to become self-motivated, competent, and lifelong learners.

- California Education Code Section 47605(b)(5)(A)

The School’s Mission

The School’s mission is to provide all students with an exceptional education that will allow them to excel inside and outside the classroom. The School seeks to achieve this mission by providing students a rigorous core curriculum, a well-trained staff, high standards and expectations, extended instructional hours and support, personalized learning opportunities, and early access to college-preparatory experiences. By ensuring students become voracious, self-motivated, competent and lifelong learners, the School will preparethem not only for college but also for the 21st Century world.

Target Population – Whom the School is Attempting to Education

The School plans to serve approximately 350 students in grades K-5.

According to demographic data compiled by the California Department of Education, the Lodi Unified School District(the “District”) enrolled 31,000 students in 2008-09. 23% were designated English Learners, and 52% were low income (i.e., eligible for Free/Reduced-price meals). Those students represented the following ethnicities:

The School seeks to enroll a student body whose diversity represents the general population of persons residing within the geographical boundaries of the District and community where the school is located.

Aspire’ educational program is designed to increase college-going rates for students who have historically been under-represented in college and who face barriers accessing a college education, specifically:

  • Students from low-income families
  • Students whose primary home language is not English
  • Students living in communities with low-performing schools and low college-going rates
  • Students who would be the first in their families to attend college

What it Means to be an Educated Person in the 21st Century

The fundamental characteristic of the new millennium is ever-accelerating change. Information is multiplying as quickly as it is becoming obsolete; ideas are continually revisited, retested and revised. At the same time, the world is becoming increasingly interdependent. Therefore, students must have a foundation of knowledge and skills to access this world of ideas, as well as the ability to analyze information, ask good questions and innovate new ideas, and express themselves thoughtfully. They must also have important academic and personal habits, including self-motivation, intellectual curiosity, analytic ability, creative thinking, moral reasoning, self-confidence, and empathic action. Thus equipped, students will excel in college and in the 21st Century world of work and citizenship.

The School’s graduates will be able to collect information in a variety of forms, including: novels, art pieces, statistical data sets, newspaper reports, historical accounts, web pages, and scientific articles. They must be able to think systematically and critically about that information, create new knowledge, and apply their thinking to real world problems. And, they must be able to express themselves effectively in variety of forms, such as essays, paintings, poems, oral presentations, mathematical arguments, and scientific rebuttals.

How Learning Best Occurs

Student learning best occurs when a school’s structures, academic program, pedagogical strategies, curriculum standards and materials, assessments, culture, and support systemsare all aligned towards the same, college-preparatory goal. While many of the elements described below are expected to be in place from the first day of the School’s opening, other elements may be implemented as students matriculate into higher grades and/or as the School becomes more established.

Structures to Support Learning

The School is structured to support high student achievement by creating many personalized learning opportunities, with smaller school and class sizes and more time in the school day for learning.

SmallSchool Size

The small size of Aspire’s schools creates school communities where each student is known personally. Research shows that small schools allow students and teachers to develop intensive, long-term relationships that enable better conditions for teaching and learning.[1]

Small class sizes

In smaller classes, teachers can give each individual student the time and attention necessary to realize his or her personal academic goals. The School’s goal is a 20:1 student: teacher ratio in grades kindergarten through third grade, and 28:1 in fourth through fifth grades.

Longer school day

Students learn more when they are given more time to learn each day. With more time, teachers can delve into topics more deeplycover more topics. The school’s day will be approximately seven and a half hours – or about 60 minutes more instruction each day than students in many traditional public schoolsreceive. In addition, the school provides a robust after-school program which provides homework help, additional academic tutoring, and enrichment activities.

Longer school year

The School will provide 187 regular days of instruction, seven days more than traditional public schools provide, and twelve more than the legal minimum applicable for charter schools. In addition, each year the School will hold three additional days of instruction on Saturdays The School will commence its school year prior to September 30, during which parents are encouraged to attend specially-designed academic programs with their children.

 SeeAppendix IIafor sample school year calendar

Classroom looping

The School will “loop” in kindergarten/first grade, second grade/third grade and fourth grade/fifth grade, meaning that students stay with the same classroom teacher for two grades. This allows teachers and students to have deep, continuous relationships. It also allows teachers to begin the second year with instructional knowledge about every student. Students can receive instruction on the first day of school, instead of spending time establishing rules and procedures.

Summer School and Inter-sessions

The School, either separately or in collaboration with another Aspire school, may offer special academic programs during normal school holidays. These programs may include opportunities for acceleration (such as deep exploration of a single topic) or remediation (such as extra work on basic skills).

Pedagogical Strategies

Aspire educators use the organization’s Instructional Guidelines, which describe a variety of effective pedagogical strategies for each subject area. Importantly, the strategies in the Instructional Guidelines are also designed to enable educators to differentiate instruction for individual students. Instructional Guidelines have been designed based on both research and best practices. Instructional Guidelines are not a script, and good implementation of Aspire’s program requires highly skilled teachers. Model lessons by exemplar teachers, visits to Aspire Model Classrooms, and coaching by the school principal all help individual teachers in implementing the Instructional Guidelines effectively.

Broadly, the Instructional Guidelines require use of a variety of pedagogical strategies, including:

  • Explicit Instruction: provides students a traditional form of teaching wherein the teacher presents the lesson and students individually demonstrate their new skills or knowledge.[2]
  • Guided and Independent Practice: Students will be given multiple structured opportunities to practice newly and previously learned skills and knowledge. Practice opportunities will be concentrated immediately after explicit instruction, and also distributed over the weeks and months following introduction of new skills. Practice increases students’ retention of the newly learned material.
  • Problem Solving: gives students a step-by-step process for determining a solution.
  • Inquiry: presents students with a problem or question, around which they formulate and test theories to work towards a solution.
  • Project-based Instruction: offers students the opportunity to apply learning to complex problems; students are required to conduct extended research, analyze and synthesize information across subject areas, and develop written and oral end products.[3]

Technology is used as a tool for research, communication, and production. Students will have access to movable laptop carts and banks of computers in each classroom. Students exercise their higher-order thinking skills through simulations and presentations, their communication and production skills through desktop publishing, and their research skills through use of electronic references, including the Internet.

For an example of subject-specific guidelines, see Appendix IIb for Aspire’s K-5ELA Instructional Guidelines Table of Contents.

Curriculum Standards and Materials

Aspire schools use a combination of adopted programs and elements developed in-house to build basic skills, higher-order thinking skills, and life-skills. The curriculum is deeply rooted in California state standards, and is intended to be simultaneously rigorous and relevant to students. The School’s curriculum is clearly articulated as a K-5system and includes language arts, mathematics, science, and social science. Other subjects essential to a healthy and balanced life are also covered through classes or programs in visual arts, music, health and nutrition, and physical education.

Core curriculum materials are chosen by Aspire’s Chief Academic Officer through a collaborative process with instructional coaches, teachers and principals. In addition, individual classroom educators are encouraged to use flexibility and their professional discretion to supplement any chosen materials with a variety of texts and materials, depending on the needs of their students.