Telegraph photo of the Macon Charter Academy.

Telegraph photo of the Macon Charter Academy.

The up and down fortunes of a charter school in Macon have taken a turn for the worse. The Telegraph's Jeremy Timmerman has reported that the State Department of Education has begun the process to close the Macon Charter Academy. GPB Macon's Michael Caputo talked with Timmermen
 
A conversation with the Telegraph's Jeremy Timmerman on the closing of the Macon Charter Academy.

Michael Caputo: Tell us what you've learned. 

Jeremy Timmerman:  Well no problem coming in. It's really it's kind of something that a lot of people have seen coming and of course everybody's always quick when something like this happens, "you know it was coming" but it's been. 

Jeremy Timmerman: The finger has been on the trigger to do this for a while but it really seemed like it was turning in a good direction and it's kind of the feeling I got from the head of the governing board there the present the governing board, Ed Grant, was just that he kind of felt like things were going well even as as people from the state were coming down and doing visits. 

Michael Caputo:  Indications from the state even where that they were that they thought they were happy with who they had brought in which I believe is? 

Jeremy Timmerman: Prestige Charter School Solutions it's out of Atlanta. They also have an office in Raleigh I think it is somewhere North Carolina. 

Michael Caputo: But that took a turn for the worse in the latest that you learned is what that that this isn't working out or that this isn't happening. 

Jeremy Timmerman:  Well my sense that I got from from both Ed Grant and Curtis Jones the superintendent of Bibb Schools was that the state was never really thrilled with Prestige. In fact Prestige wasn't among the group, that wasn't a part of the true turnaround firms (which is something I've learned in this process that there are turnaround firms there. There are companies out there like Renaissance school services which was a group that have been tied to Macon Charter for a little while that that's what they do is they turn around troubled charter schools. 

Jeremy Timmerman: And Prestige really doesn't do that. Prestige their primary function, what they do they work with what ACE, the Academy of Classical Education in North Bibb County. They're kind of the back office they do a lot of those things where a school district would have someone who manage the budget. Someone who specializes in doing the requests for proposals on furniture and supplies. A charter school would necessarily have a department for that yet so they pay Prestige to come in to do the functions of of multiple staffers. There was some hope that that company for a lower cost than Renaissance, because Renaissance is going to be four hundred thousand dollars. That's a lot for a school like MCA. Prestige was a fraction of that I think it was a hundred twenty five thousand or something don't quote me on that. But it was it was a lot less that they could accomplish some of that financial structure, that government structure some of that operational stuff. The state just wasn't thrilled with that whole thing. 

Michael Caputo: So just to recap there. The idea was that to bring in somebody who is going to turn the school around somebody like a Renaissance as you were talking about but instead they brought in somebody with less cost and cost was a big deal to the Macon Charter Academy Board, they didn't have a lot of money brought in Prestige. Prestige isn't really what working out for them but the state is a little bit. They haven't said precisely what has turned them the other way just that they have turned and that they are looking to close right. 

Jeremy Timmerman: Yeah I mean I got I was I was. My contact Lou Erste is the assistant superintendent that over charter schools and things like that. He was very forthcoming that, yes the process has started. We've started that ball rolling. But he would he didn't tell me exactly why. I do know that you know from from what I've heard, and from who have talked, to the there was some sort of site visit as a part of this whole process and that things just weren't the way the way the picture had been painted, I guess, in the the monthly progress reports. So it I don't really know exactly what it was. 

Jeremy Timmerman: But there's also the notion that that it's only been a month a little over a month a month and 10 days six weeks whatever because I want to say it since they started with Prestige so it it would be interesting to me to find out what that was that the state thought they would see after six weeks that they weren't. 

Michael Caputo:  So again folks I want you to make sure that you go to Macon dot com for the full story done by Jeremy Timmerman of the Telegraph about the Macon Charter Academy school being closed by the state again Jeremy thank you very much for coming in. 

Jeremy Timmerman:  No problem.