Well-Intentioned But Flawed (And Perhaps Dangerous)

“The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”

– German Proverb

Almost 11% of the unhoused population in the United States is located within the City and County of Los Angeles. In 2023, only New York City had more than the 71,320 Angelenos without a home. For visualization, that is more than the number of people who attended Super Bowl LXI at the $5.5 billion SoFi Stadium.

While most of the dialog surrounding the issue of homelessness seems more focused on hiding this population from view rather than fixing the causes of the problem, Dr. Hattie Mitchell appears to be different. She and her husband founded the Crete Academy, an independent charter school, to assist these students and others trapped in extreme poverty.

The public tends to stereotype the unhoused as drug-addicted adults, alcoholics, and mentally ill, but there are 10,710 families within this population. “Transitional Age Youth,” young adults aging out of foster care, accounted for 2,406 members of the population. In the last school year, 17,245 students enrolled in the LAUSD were classified as homeless. They would barely fit in the brand-new $1.8 billion Intuit Dome if gathered together.

Unfortunately, Mitchell’s testimony before the LAUSD School Board on December 10th raised questions about how the charter school approaches its mission. The prepared speech was meant to provide the Board with an example of why the school’s charter should be renewed but instead highlighted why an in-depth investigation is needed.

As Mitchell detailed in her speech, the school’s Office Manager was having lunch at Taco Bell across from the school when she noticed a young child sitting alone in a booth. She thought this was “odd” but did not intervene in any way.

When the employee returned to the restaurant the following day she noticed that the boy was sitting alone again in the booth. This time she called Mitchell who decided to get permission from the boy’s mother to take him home.

At the home, they found two other school-age kids in their pajamas who were covered in bug bites and scars and, by her account, malnourished. According to Mitchell, the house reeked of urine and lacked furniture except for an air mattress and a baby mattress. In a comment that suggested ableism, she noted that “the mom was in a wheelchair wearing a diaper and a t-shirt, clearly unable to care for these kids.”

While Mitchell said that the children did enroll in her school, she did not specify if it provided them with any services unique to her program, negating the tale as evidence the charter should be renewed.

When the employee returned to the restaurant the following day she noticed that the boy was sitting alone again in the booth. This time she called Mitchell who decided to get permission from the boy’s mother to take him home.

Educators are mandatory reporters, obligated to get DCFS involved when the health and safety of children are at risk. While poverty should not be criminalized, there seemed to be other issues involved, especially since Mitchell noted that the mother was “clearly unable to care for these kids.” While it is admirable to want to “support and [rally] around a mom that needs help to care for her kids,” agencies trained to handle these situations should not have been excluded from the process.

Other red flags are raised by the charter school’s website, especially about the truthfulness of the data it uses to market the school. In one video that is linked to the school’s website, the claim is made that “30% of Crete Academy students are homeless.” However, in the certified numbers provided to the state in their SARC report, Crete says 21.1% of the student body is unhoused.

In another video, Mitchell claims that 20% of the students receive Special Education. This is significantly higher than the 8.2% cited in the SARC Report. Thirteen percent of the students in the entire LAUSD are classified as having disabilities. The difference means that Crete is avoiding the costs of providing the services needed by these students.

The school’s explanation of its enrollment process suggests how it avoids meeting its responsibilities. It states that applications are “reviewed and the school’s capacity to accommodate your child will be assessed.” Under the laws requiring a Free and Appropriate Education (FAPE), all children must be served by this publicly funded school as long as there is room for them. The school is not currently at the target enrollment specified in its charter so no student should have ever been rejected. A student not being a “good fit” is not a lawful reason for not enrolling them in the school.

According to the minutes of a recent meeting of the governing board for Crete, the LAUSD Charter School Division (CSD) has issued a Notice of Concern to the school. If this or any other concern, notice to cure or violation is still open, consideration of the renewal should be postponed until the school is in compliance. It should also be verified that parents were notified of these violations in compliance with the District’s rules.

Crete Academy operates in BD1, which Sherlett Hendy Newbill now represents. This will be Newbill’s first group of charter school renewals, and she needs to set a tone of being tough but fair with these schools. To do so, she must show her constituents that she is diving deeply into how these schools operate and vote to reject any whose answers do not allay concerns. The era of free public money without accountability must end.

Carl Petersen is a parent advocate for public education, particularly for students with special education needs, who serves as the Education Chair for the Northridge East Neighborhood Council. As a Green Party candidate in LAUSD’s District 2 School Board race, he was endorsed by Network for Public Education (NPE) Action. Dr. Diane Ravitch has called him “a valiant fighter for public schools in Los Angeles.” For links to his blogs, please visit www.ChangeTheLAUSD.com. Opinions are his own.