Report flags Commonwealth Charter Academy’s spending on cars, entertainment

Pennsylvania’s largest cyber charter school spent nearly $600,000 at car dealerships and car washes in one year, and $400,000 on entertainment expenses, according to a new report from a public education advocacy group.

Those were just some of the expenses the advocates flagged as a “misuse of tax dollars” after reviewing Commonwealth Charter Academy’s check registers, obtained through right-to-know requests to the cyber school. The report from Education Voters PA, which examined check registers from July 2022 through June 2023, also found the charter paid $116,000 in dining expenses, including to bars and vineyards.

And many other expenses lacked explanation or went to redacted vendors, the group said. For instance, the charter spent $400,000 at various stores for unidentified shopping expenses and gave more than $1 million to charter families, in payments coded as “family mentor” or “student/caretaker.”

“Every dollar that CCA spends on DoorDash or luxury vehicles, or at brew pubs or vineyards or exclusive clubs, is a dollar that was paid by a Pennsylvania taxpayer,” Education Voters said in the report.

Those dollars, the group said, could instead be used by public school districts to “to reduce class sizes, hire aides, or pay for special education services. They could be used to fix leaky roofs, abate asbestos, or install HVAC systems.”

The group also flagged $8.8 million spent on “advertising and promotion,” but said it would share more details about that spending in a future report.

A CCA spokesperson, Timothy Eller, did not comment on the report’s specific findings, but said in a statement Monday that “every dollar that CCA receives is used for the benefit of all enrolled students.”

“The cherry-picked and isolated expenditures highlighted by Ed Voters for school-related travel expenses are well within what is customary for organizations of like size that have a statewide footprint,” Eller said, noting that Commonwealth Charter Academy has a budget of $500 million and employs 2,400 staff.

Accusing Education Voters of “unfounded accusations and defamatory statements,” Eller said, “It’s important to know that Ed Voters of PA in no way represents Pennsylvania voters who overwhelmingly support school choice.”

Susan Spicka, executive director of Education Voters, said its “fiscal sponsor” is the Keystone Research Center, a left-leaning Harrisburg think tank. However, Education Voters gets funding from separate sources, “primarily foundations,” Spicka said.

Controversy over cyber charters

Pennsylvania’s cyber charters have long been targeted by public education advocates, who see them as a drain on school district budgets. School districts pay cyber charters tuition for each student they enroll, at the same rates that brick-and-mortar charters receive. The rates are tied to what school districts spend, so they vary widely across the state.

Commonwealth Charter Academy, which enrolled more than 23,000 students in 2023-24, has grown rapidly in recent years. (In his statement Monday, Eller said the school now enrolls 33,000.) As Pennsylvania continues to struggle to adequately fund its traditional public schools, critics have taken aim at CCA’s growing assets, including properties the charter has been buying statewide.

Critics also say it operates with little transparency: While school boards typically post meeting agendas online with details on spending actions, CCA’s board agendas lack specifics on proposed spending. To get information on what the charter’s board will be voting on, citizens have to request it directly.

“If a school district paid for the membership to an exclusive Harrisburg club, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on cash payments to families, or purchased a luxury vehicle, community members in that school district would know because there would be a public vote on these expenses at their local school board meeting,” Education Voters said in the report.

And the information the charter supplies doesn’t necessarily reveal how it’s spending money, the group said, given how many payments are made to redacted entities.

What CCA spent money on

In its report, Education Voters PA categorized the expenses it reviewed into the following buckets:

Calls for accountability

The report calls on the state to open a forensic audit of CCA and other cyber charter schools “to determine whether their expenditures and reporting have complied with state law.”

“Given the number of redactions, it is really important that somebody from the outside come in and take a good look at the spending,” Susan Spicka, Education Voters’ director, said during a news conference on Monday.

Eller said CCA is subject to “annual, independent audits by well-regarded experienced firms, which have had no negative findings and no indications of improprieties.” The charter files audits with the state annually, he said.

The report also calls for the enactment of a flat $9,500 tuition rate from school districts to cyber charters; currently, regular education tuition rates range from $7,659 to $28,959 per student, depending on the student’s sending district.

The state Department of Education should also hire staff to work specifically on evaluating cyber charters whose operating agreements with the state have expired, while the legislature should enact a moratorium on opening new cyber charters until all existing charters have current agreements, according to Education Voters.