Senator asks education
board to hire chief
for charter schools
HILO >> A key state senator said he was disappointed by the Board of Education's lack of progress in choosing an executive director to oversee Hawaii's charter schools, as mandated by a new law.
Public charter schools are designed to provide alternatives to conventional public schools and to be free of much of the state's educational bureaucracy.
A new law sets up an agency to oversee charter schools statewide to help them achieve greater autonomy.
It mandates that the board choose the agency's executive director from nominees submitted by an association of charter schools.
The agency is not fully operational because the board has not approved the charter schools' nomination for executive director.
"We ... made our recommendation to the board on Sept. 30," said Donna Estomago, president of the Hawaii Charter Schools Network. "Of the 23 applicants we considered, one emerged as the unanimous choice of all 26 charter schools statewide, so we submitted that name."
However, the board is demanding that the charter schools submit at least three names for consideration.
"It's a very frustrating situation," said Carol Gabbard, chairwoman of the board's charter school committee. "The law says we must receive 'recommendations' -- plural -- and we only got one."
The board has asked the attorney general's office for clarification.
State Sen. Norman Sakamoto, chairman of the Senate's education committee, said it was not the intent of the legislation to require multiple nominees.
"We were hopeful that the charter schools could agree on one. Our intention was that they may recommend a single person," said Sakamoto, D, Salt Lake-Foster Village. "I hope the board would reconsider."
