WASHINGTON— Today, Rep. Raúl M. Grijalva led 14 Members of Congress in a letter to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos expressing concern about the lack of oversight of the U.S. Department of Education’s Charter Schools Program (CSP). According to a recent report on the CSP, hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars were awarded to charter schools that never opened or opened and closed within a short period of time. The lawmakers wrote:

“An analysis of CSP data from 2006-2014 indicates that nearly one out of three CSP grant awardees were not currently in operation by the end of 2015. It is also unknown what happens to CSP grant funds when an awardee fails to open or opens and closes within one academic year.

“It is clear that oversight of CSP grant awardees is significantly lacking. Reviewers are only allowed to look at the grant application and are not permitted to verify if any of the information presented in the application is accurate. This encourages false or selective reporting of data as applicants know that the reviewers cannot verify or dispute any of the information presented in the application.“

The lawmakers requested responses to the inquiries by June 30, 2019.

Click here to read the full letter.

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