CELEBRATING 25 YEARS OF CHARTER SCHOOLS The Beginnings By Eric Smith, CEO of Smithfam Holdings, Founder of UAPCS In the fall of 2000, my wife, Michelle, came to me, bursting with excitement about a school she had heard about up at the Sundance ski resort. It was a small one-room elementary school with only about 40 students. She had plans to visit the next day, and when she came back that evening, she was even more thrilled. The school was free to attend and was a charter school. At the time, I had heard of charter schools but didn’t know much about them. However, her excitement quickly turned to disappointment when she learned there was a waiting list with hundreds of children, meaning our kids had almost no chance of attending. While visiting with the principal, Michelle discovered that there were two groups in Utah trying to start new charter schools — one in Cache Valley and the other in northern Utah County. Since we lived in Lindon, Utah, she contacted Debbie Besselievre, who was leading the effort to start a school called Timpanogos Academy. The next day, Michelle met Debbie and learned about their mission. Debbie had recently moved from Colorado, where her children attended a Core Knowledge charter school that she loved, and she wanted to create something similar here in Utah. She had already put flyers on doors in Cedar Hills, gathering about a dozen families to support the cause. As Michelle and I became more involved, we learned a lot about charter schools and their origins in states like Minnesota and Wisconsin. We also found out that the little school in Sundance was part of a small pilot program created in 1998 through Utah Legislation sponsored by Rep. Brian Allen. This program allowed up to eight charter schools to be established for a few years. Unfortunately, the new school phase of the pilot was over, and the entire program was set to expire. Determined to make a difference, we joined forces with another group working to start a school in Logan (which later became Thomas Edison Charter School). Together, we set out to pass a bill expanding charter schools and making the program permanent. In this process, we met Sen. Howard Stephenson, who sponsored SB169 in the 2001 Legislative session. This bill allowed for the creation of four new state-sponsored charter schools per year plus unlimited district-sponsored charter schools. It also removed the “pilot” status, giving existing schools much-needed stability. Later that year, three new charters were granted — to Thomas Edison Charter School, John Hancock Charter School and Timpanogos Academy. At the time, it felt like the end of all our challenges, but little did we know that it was just the beginning. Back in 2001, there was no startup funding for charter schools; 6
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