The Shawnee News-Star

GUEST COLUMN

Epic’s violations of
state law increasing
A
By Sen. Ron Sharp fi
T
he allegations and evidence against

A
Epic Charter Schools is increas-
ing. Some parents have been upset
with recent developments but please know
Aug the quality of education is not being ques-
tioned but the unethical and, possibly illegal, s
p
31 enrollment practices and misuse of state
funds. Epic is using millions of dollars of a
E
taxpayer funds, and just as any other public
school district, they must be accountable for
their spending and follow the law. J
2019 I’ve been working to address the ques-
tionable practices and lack of oversight and
b
I
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numerous bills to address various aspects,
Page but many of those were never even heard
in committee. Now that the public knows
s
a
S
A006 that Epic is under both federal and state
investigation, you’ll probably see many of my a
bills get more attention in the legislature and S
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as well.
resized Epic manages two different charter D
schools: Epic One on One Virtual Charter e
31% School, which is sponsored by the Oklahoma a
Statewide Virtual Charter School Board a
(OSVCSB) and Epic Blended Charter School b
(BLC) which is a “brick and mortar charter b
school”, sponsored by Rose State College. The
two types of charters have different rules and t
statutes they must follow. a
In a July 11th release, I questioned why the o
Oklahoma State Department of Education r
(OSDE) had allocated tax dollars to Epic w
Blended Charter School (their brick and mor- S
tar schools in Oklahoma and Tulsa Counties) m
for two years for grade levels its administra-
tion admitted it didn’t accommodate in its J
HQUROOPHQW7KHLQIRUPDWLRQZDVDOVRYHUL¿HG i
on their website. Epic’s Assistant Superin- f
tendent of Communications, Shelly Hickman, h
emailed me saying “In FY 17-18, we served b
PreK-5 in two BLC sites (one in Oklahoma
County and one Tulsa County). In FY 18-19,
we served PreK-6 at three BLC sites (two in
Oklahoma County and one in Tulsa County)”.
BLC stands for Blending Learning Center.
However, the OSDE had provided tax
dollars for 7,073 students at grade levels the
school admitted they did not accommodate.
In FY 2017-18, Epic Blended Charter School
(EBCS) was allocated $23,029,667.52
and in FY 2018-19, the school received
$41,168,058,80.
Epic responded to the media saying that all
their Tulsa and Oklahoma County students
were counted under the blended learner en-
rollment whether they accessed the BLCs or
not. Therefore, all grades not accommodated
in those two counties that didn’t have a BLC
were still counted as BLC attendees. Students
in all the other counties were listed under
Epic One on One.
They said reporting all their students as
virtual charter school students was in accor-
dance to state law. However, the OSDE veri-
¿HGWKDWWKH\¶UHLQFRUUHFWDQGWKH%/&VPXVW
follow the same attendance requirements as
traditional brick and mortar charter schools,
not virtual charters.
On August 12th, OSVCSB Executive Di-
rector Dr. Rebecca Wilkinson responded to
some questions regarding charter and virtual
charter enrollment and attendance. She
FRQ¿UPHGWKDWWKH%/&VDUHQ¶WIXOOWLPHYLU-
tual charter schools and because they aren’t
sponsored by the OSVCSB, the Oklahoma 777
Administrative Rules don’t apply to them.
I also asked her if a student enrolled full-
time in a virtual charter school sponsored by
the OSVCSB be counted in the enrollment
and subsequent attendance of a charter
school not sponsored by the OSVCSB. This
is what Epic did by listing their Oklahoma
and Tulsa County Epic One on One students
under the BLC enrollment. Her response was
that “would create an illegal dual enrollment
situation in two public schools”.
Reporting a 99% attendance for both Epic
One on One and the BLC after this arbitrary
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an attempt by Epic to submit dual-enroll-
ment for an OSDE allocation.
There are other issues with their atten-
dance and enrollment policies. The virtual
charter attendance policy in state law allows
a virtual charter school to count its student
attendance by the completion of 40 assign-
ments during a quarter period of reporting.
According to the OSVCSB administrative
rules, a student is prohibited from receiving
nine hours or more of face-to-face instruction
from a teacher.
Subsequently, regardless of whether Tulsa
and Oklahoma County students are counted
in Epic’s virtual charter or its brick and mor-
tar charter schools, both are non-compliant
to statutory enrollment and attendance
policies. Epic’s July 11th media responses
provided evidence of their non-compliance to
Oklahoma statutes and Administrative Rules.
I’ll discuss more issues and state law
regarding charters and virtual charters next
week.
To contact me at the Capitol, please write
to Senator Ron Sharp, State Capitol, 2300 N.
Lincoln Blvd. Room 412, Oklahoma City, OK,
73105 or call (405) 521-5539.

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