Loveland Classical Schools Supported by State Board of Ed

In a 6-1 vote, the State Board of Education voted to remand the Loveland Classical School charter school appeal back to the Thompson School District for further consideration.

Thompson has only one charter school -- New Vision Charter School - and it also had to appeal before being approved by the local district. The district has less than 2% of its students enrolled in the charter school. The state average is 8.97%.

The district used the new charter school application review rubric and pointed out deficiencies in the application based on that review. Attorney for the charter school, Barry Arrington, pointed out that no charter school application is perfect and with a 1,000 page application, the charter applicants had certainly provided everything necessary to be approved to open a new charter school.

A couple of State Board members raised concerns about the short timeline in which to open a new school and Chairman Bob Schaffer pointed out that Liberty Common School in Fort Collins (which he helped start) was approved in June and opened two and a half months later. He also noted that most of the charter school either have just as short a timeline, or even shorter.

Loveland Classical School plans to open with grades K-11 in the fall. They already have almost 1,000 students already expressing an interest in attending.