Idaho Falls charter school waits in limbo

The Idaho Public Charter Commission announced Wednesday evening it would be canceling its meeting set for Sept. 4. The commission was supposed to announce whether or not it would revoke Odyssey Charter School’s charter.
The email sent to parents, the school’s legal counsel and school board stated the following:

Dear Odyssey Stakeholder:
I am writing to advise you that the September 4, 2014, special meeting has been cancelled. Please feel free to monitor the Public Charter School Commission website to ensure that you are aware of future meeting notices.
Regards,
Tamara Baysinger
PCSC Director

Founder of Odyssey Charter and the parent of three of its students, Andrew Whitfold said the school board and parents are anxious to receive a decision.

“It’s kind of hard to decide which way to take it, whether they’ve given us more time or whether they are just meeting together to try and figure out another avenue,” said Whitfold.

But thoughts are a little different for Odyssey Charter School Principal Travis Jensen. He said he was never notified by the school board of the change and received notice through a parent.

“I’m just curious as to why. I don’t know what made that change. We’ve got students at our school, and we’re kind of in limbo right now as we wait to find out what will happen with our charter,” said Jensen.

When asked why the meeting was canceled, PCSC Director Tamara Baysinger stated it was the only decision that would ensure an expedited response. Baysinger said the commission went into an executive session to prepare for the Sept. 4 meeting earlier this week. She said although the meeting was legal the charter school’s legal counsel felt otherwise. Rather than go into a lengthy arbitration, she said the commission decided it would redo the executive meeting, meaning that it would have to postpone the meeting on Sept. 4th, as well as announcing its final decision.

“Instead of fighting that issue over in court and taking up a lot of time and putting students and families and teachers at Odyssey on hold while the court dealt with that, we would rather just reschedule,” said Baysinger. “We’ll do a meeting to cover that same item so that everybody is comfortable with a legal meeting.”

The commission plans to hold its meeting sometime next week to announce its decision. This comes after the school was issued a letter of intent in June. The school failed to meet an accreditation during the 2013-14 school year, which is also the first year the school was open. The school has since filed an appeal and has hired Travis Jensen for his expertise in bringing schools up to accreditation standards.