The Columbus school district is accused of cheating students out of good buildings after it decided to lease its nicest vacant building to a startup music-industry program instead of one of three well-regarded charter schools.


The most vocal critic is the vice president of the Columbus school board, Stephanie Groce. In an opinion piece published in The Dispatch last week, she accused the district of clinging to petty anti-charter sentiments and protecting "a broken system at the expense of children" by passing over the charter middle schools.

Some charter-school supporters are throwing up their hands in frustration. Why, they're wondering, would the district offer a prime property - on 5th Avenue, just north of Victorian Village - to Groove U, a new for-profit trade school that might serve only 25 students in its first year?

Tenants "have to support our mission, fill an unmet need and provide a benefit to our students," said Carole Olshavsky, who oversees district facilities. "Clearly, another school that is providing a competing service to ours is not" an unmet need.

In addition, she said, "there are a very, very small number of middle-school kids in that 5th Avenue area, so there is not an unmet need in terms of number of students."

That logic is bogus, Groce said in an interview.

"I hate to state the obvious, but Columbus Collegiate Academy is already in the area and has a student body. So that argument is laughable. Beyond that, no one is accusing Columbus City Schools of having too many high-performing middle schools," she said.

Charters are public, tuition-free schools that compete with traditional school districts for students.

The district's former Fifth Avenue Elementary is air-conditioned and the most move-in ready of the dozen vacant buildings the Columbus school district wants to lease to tenants. Many of the empty schools need extensive renovations, something that charter schools typically can't afford.

"You can't get private dollars to repair something that you don't own," said Andy Boy, principal of Columbus Collegiate.

The academy, located in a Weinland Park church, serves about 100 children and is one of the highest-performing middle schools in the city. Also vying for the 5th Avenue property were Columbus Preparatory Academy, which is a K-8 school that earned an A grade from the state, and Graham Expeditionary Middle School, which is affiliated with two successful charters, the Graham School and Charles School.

"Who wouldn't want the highest-performing middle school in Columbus in their neighborhood unless they were apprehensive about the competition?" said Bill Sims, who heads the Ohio Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

District officials don't think they deserve to be labeled unfriendly to charters.

"It's not like they can't lease one of our buildings, but for a strange set of circumstances, we had lots of people interested in one building," Olshavsky said. "There are plenty of opportunities for the other entities to end up with a building they'd be happy with."

Three buildings are being leased to charter schools, and the district plans to lease a fourth, the former Douglas Elementary, she said. A private school also recently leased a vacant Columbus building.

Groove U wishes its name wasn't being associated with the district-versus-charter controversy.

"This ends up being a fight between administration and the school board. We don't feel like it's necessarily fair to us," said Dwight Heckelman, Groove U's founder. Lost in the fight, he said, is that Groove U is unique and will serve Columbus City Schools graduates.

The principal of the district's Fort Hayes Arts and Academic High School serves on Groove U's advisory board; that partnership was a selling point for Columbus schools, Olshavsky said.

Groce said she has no quarrel with Groove U. She just thinks the charters, particularly Columbus Collegiate, are getting a raw deal.

"Essentially, we've decided to capitalize a for-profit startup without any assurance that they can pay the electric bill - and no record of student success," she said.

Board President Carol L. Perkins said she didn't know about the real-estate deals until she read Groce's piece in the newspaper. But she doesn't see a problem.

"I am comfortable with the decision that's been made based on board policy," she said.

Columbus Collegiate and the Graham middle school still hope to lease space from Columbus elsewhere.

"I choose to remain positive and believe they found something that was going to be really great for this community. And we'll continue to search for something else," Boy said.

Choosing Groove U was a business decision, said Greg Brown, executive dean of the Graham family of schools.

"I believe Columbus wants what's right for kids," he said. "I'm disappointed in the decision in that it wasn't us. But ... we're still going to get to some arrangement because we want our middle school to serve kids in that neighborhood."