INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis Public Schools is moving to cut ties with Ignite Achievement Academy for not making enough progress. Now, the charter says it may file a lawsuit.
In 2017, Ignite Achievement Academy took over the failing Elder W. Diggs School. IPS said in that time, the charter school did make some progress, but not enough.
IPS points to dropping enrollment, low attendance numbers and not enough academic progress, as well as the failure to retain teachers.
"It was still performing, academically, in the bottom tier of our district schools overall,” said IPS Superintendent Dr. Aleesia Johnson.
Ignite's co-founder and Head of School Shy-Quon Ely said those failures are taken out of context, arguing the district didn’t give the charter enough time to turn things around.
"It tends to take anywhere from five to seven years to successfully (restart a school)," Ely said. “That's with normal conditions. OK, so we're in our fifth year of restarting the Diggs school. This is the third year of a pandemic. We've had two years of new state testing."
Ely said enrollment changes were expected. The school population is at risk, so it would obviously face additional troubles during a pandemic. As for retaining teachers, Ely argued that’s an issue for all schools right now.
Ely also blames IPS for not providing enough supports – especially in special education and transportation. He said the school did make some inroads, reporting it increased reading test scores by double digits and passed recent evaluations by the Office of Education Innovation Charters schools.
Ely said the academy already planned to branch out on its own. However, it’s now also considering suing the district, but has not yet filed.
The board will vote on the renewal issue Thursday.
As for what’s next for students, IPS may take back the school or team up with a different charter.
This is the second time the district has recommended not renewing an innovation agreement with a charter school. The first time was with Charter Schools USA. In 2020, the state reversed its decision to have the charter school run three struggling IPS schools.