We had some experience considering a brand new charter school that sounded awesome in the preliminary planning stages. It was going to be all STEM, and I volunteered on the hiring committee. This school also didn't yet have a lease anywhere. In the midst of the hiring process, the founding Board members had disagreements as to the direction of the school, things changed, and several Board members resigned and were replaced with people of a different focus. The school ended up moving to an entirely different location, much further than we could have driven. I'm not sure how it's doing now, but I see it's still in existence. So I guess my warning is to beware of the first year of any charter school. Could be great, but there are lots of unknowns.
That was pretty much our experience with a new charter as well. We moved from our neighborhood elementary b/c I was told by the district coordinator to homeschool dd13 (7 at the time) and that they were philosophically opposed to meeting her needs
. Truly, there were too many things she needed and wasn't going to get in our neighborhood school and I do think that it was a good choice to move. The charter offered subject acceleration, had hired some truly outstanding teachers from a private school than had recently closed, talked a good talk, etc.
Once there, the principal was fired right before school started and we went through two or three more by the end of the school year, teachers quit or were fired mid-year, half the kids who came were likely gifted or bordering on it and the other half were juvenile delinquents, the problems were just huge. We didn't last more than one year and my younger dd was educationally derailed in that year which took a while to get back on track.
Do you have any other options of choicing to a different school that are not a new charter? I might consider sticking it out at your same school for this one last year of elementary and spending the year researching choice options for jr high that would be a good fit and more time tested.
I, too, have done different schools in different districts with different breaks for my two kids b/c they had different needs at the time. It is a hassle, but it is doable.
