Benefits to Lager and ECOT

First, the benefits that we know about to Lager and ECOT. As mentioned from 2001-2016, Lager’s Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow received more than $1 billion from Ohio taxpayers.

Here’s one of the advertisements paid for with taxpayer funds that ECOT used to try to lobby the Ohio Department of Education.

x YouTube Video

Donations from Lager to influential Ohio politicians

Second, the political donations that we know about. In a 2014 article, journalists at Plunderbund put together this excellent table of donations to ECOT from 2001-2014:

Donations from William Lager to Ohio politicians from 2000-2014.

Lager also allegedly gave money to employees to make donations to politicians. The Ohio Republican Party recently returned a $36,000 donation from Melissa Vasil, director of operations at ECOT.

Here is the full dataset of known donations from William Lager through 2015. The politicians and political organizations Lager donated to during this time were:

Ohio House Republican Organizational Committee

Ohio Republican State Central and Executive Committee

Republican Senate Campaign Committee

Mike DeWine (R-Attorney General, 2011-present)

(R-Attorney General, 2011-present) Bill Batchelder , (Republican, Speaker of the Ohio House, 2011-2014)

, (Republican, Speaker of the Ohio House, 2011-2014) Cliff Rosenberger (Republican, speaker of the Ohio House until 2018 when he resigned under investigation)

(Republican, speaker of the Ohio House until 2018 when he resigned under investigation) Kirk Schuring (R-Canton, Speaker of the House, 2018 interim)

(R-Canton, Speaker of the House, 2018 interim) Ryan Smith (R-Granville, Speaker of the House, 2018-present)

(R-Granville, Speaker of the House, 2018-present) Andrew Brenner (Republican, Chair of the House Education Committee, 2011-present)

(Republican, Chair of the House Education Committee, 2011-present) David Yost (R-State Auditor, 2011-present)

(R-State Auditor, 2011-present) Brian Hill (R-Zanesville, State Rep, 2011-present)

(R-Zanesville, State Rep, 2011-present) Ron Amstutz (R-Wayne County, State Rep, 1983-2000, 2009-2016)

(R-Wayne County, State Rep, 1983-2000, 2009-2016) Louis Blessing III (R-Colerain, State Rep, 2013-present)

(R-Colerain, State Rep, 2013-present) Jim Buchy , (former state representative R-Greenville, 1983-2000, 2011-2016)

, (former state representative R-Greenville, 1983-2000, 2011-2016) Jamie Callende r (R-Lake County, State Rep, 1997-2004)

r (R-Lake County, State Rep, 1997-2004) Cheryl Grossman (R-Grove City, State Rep, 2009-2016)

(R-Grove City, State Rep, 2009-2016) Mike Duffey (R-Columbus, State Rep, 2011-present)

(R-Columbus, State Rep, 2011-present) Randy Gardner (R-2 nd District, State Senator, 2013-present)

(R-2 District, State Senator, 2013-present) Rob McColley (R-1 st District, State Senator, 2017-present)

(R-1 District, State Senator, 2017-present) Mike Dovilla (R-Olmsted, State Rep, 2012-2016)

(R-Olmsted, State Rep, 2012-2016) Larry Obhof (R-22 nd District, State Senator, 2011-present)

(R-22 District, State Senator, 2011-present) Jeff Rezabek (R-Clayton, State Rep, 2015-2018)

(R-Clayton, State Rep, 2015-2018) Scott Ryan (R-Granville, 2015-present)

(R-Granville, 2015-present) Barbara Sears (R-Toledo, 2008-2016)

(R-Toledo, 2008-2016) Stephanie Kunze (R-24 th district, State Senator, 2017-present)

(R-24 district, State Senator, 2017-present) Michael Stinziano (D-Columbus, City Councilman, 2017-present, former Ohio House rep, 2011-16)

(D-Columbus, City Councilman, 2017-present, former Ohio House rep, 2011-16) Kyle Koehler (R-Springfield, State Rep, 2015-present)

(R-Springfield, State Rep, 2015-present) Tony Burkley (R-Paulding, State Rep, 2013-2016)

(R-Paulding, State Rep, 2013-2016) Jim Hughes (R-Columbus, State Rep, 2017-present)

(R-Columbus, State Rep, 2017-present) Chris Widener (R-10 th district, State Senator, 2009-2016)

(R-10 district, State Senator, 2009-2016) Doug Green (R-Mt. Orab, State Rep, 2013-present)

(R-Mt. Orab, State Rep, 2013-present) Jeff McClain (R-Sandusky, State Rep, 2009-2016)

(R-Sandusky, State Rep, 2009-2016) John Adams (R-Sydney, State Rep, 2007-2014)

(R-Sydney, State Rep, 2007-2014) Peter Stautberg (R-Cincinnati, State Rep, 2008-2012)

(R-Cincinnati, State Rep, 2008-2012) Anthony DeVitis (R-Canton, 2011-present)

(R-Canton, 2011-present) William Coley II (R-4 th district, State Senator, 2011-present)

(R-4 district, State Senator, 2011-present) Bill Reineke (R-Toledo, State Rep, 2015-present)

(R-Toledo, State Rep, 2015-present) Keith Faber (R-Mercer, State Rep, 2017-present)

(R-Mercer, State Rep, 2017-present) Marlene Anielski (R-Chagrin, State Rep, 2013-present)

(R-Chagrin, State Rep, 2013-present) Tim Derickson (R- Cincinnati, State Rep, 2009-2016)

(R- Cincinnati, State Rep, 2009-2016) Tom Patton (R-Olmsted, State Rep, 2017-present)

(R-Olmsted, State Rep, 2017-present) Frank LaRose (R-27 th district, State Senator, 2011-present)

(R-27 district, State Senator, 2011-present) Matt Huffman (R-12 th district, State Senator, 2017-present)

(R-12 district, State Senator, 2017-present) Scott Oelslager (R-29 th district, State Senator, 2011-present)

(R-29 district, State Senator, 2011-present) Dorothy Pelanda (R-Marysville, State Rep, 2011-present)

(R-Marysville, State Rep, 2011-present) Terrence O’Donnell (Ohio Supreme Court Judge, 2003-present)

(Ohio Supreme Court Judge, 2003-present) Mark Romanchuk (R-Richaland, State Rep, 2013-present)

(R-Richaland, State Rep, 2013-present) Dave Burke (R-26 th district, State Senator, 2011-present)

(R-26 district, State Senator, 2011-present) Cliff Hite (R-1 st district, State Senator, 2011-2017)

(R-1 district, State Senator, 2011-2017) Tim Ginte r (R-Liverpool, State Rep, 2015-present)

r (R-Liverpool, State Rep, 2015-present) Troy Balderson (R-20th district, State Senate, 2011-present)

Here’s Dave Yost, Ohio state auditor, speaking at the 2014 ECOT graduation ceremony.

x YouTube Video

Guess his opinion changed when he figured out Ohio was being overbilled for students who weren’t actually attending ECOT.

Student results at ECOT

A recent study on online charter schools by Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education and Outcomes and the Center on Reinventing Public Education (both typically pro charter school advocates where they work) found that: Students in online charters lost an average of about 72 days of learning in reading. The average student in an online charter had lower reading scores than students in traditional schools everywhere except Wisconsin and Georgia, and had lower math scores everywhere except in Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. Students in online charters lost 180 days of learning in math during the course of a 180-day school year.

According to Margaret E. Raymond, project director at CREDO: “There’s still some possibility that there’s positive learning, but it’s so statistically significantly different from the average, it is literally as if the kid did not go to school for an entire year.”

More ECOT students either leave or fail to finish high school within four years than at any other school in the nation.

The last reported graduation rate within four years was 40.3 percent.

How did this go on for so long?

According to Sandy Theis, executive director of ProgressOhio, a leading public interest group:

ECOT usually gets what ECOT wants. But it’s become very difficult to ignore its poor performance.

As I’ve written previously about education in Ohio, writing the rules for the charter school companies looks like:

Charter schools get the contracts

There is no oversight

Oversight is used to try to “regulate” public schools out of existence by putting in place impossible standards for them to meet

In 2015, Ohio revised code exempted charter schools from over 150 public school regulations:

3314.04 Exemption from state laws and rules. Except as otherwise specified in this chapter and in the contract between a community school and a sponsor, such school is exempt from all state laws and rules pertaining to schools, school districts, and boards of education, except those laws and rules that grant certain rights to parents.

The idea we’ve all heard is that the “market” would somehow regulate itself. This idea comes from corporate special interests that want to privatize government for profit.

The problem with this thinking is that the primary purpose of charter schools is not education. The primary purpose of these companies is to return profit to owners and shareholders.

This creates a conflict of interest where these companies try to figure out the cheapest way possible to achieve some goal, usually test scores. In some cases this is tampering with test scores, in other cases it’s simply getting rid of potentially low-scoring students.

Incentives do matter. In the case of charter schools like ECOT, there’s no incentive to actually provide an education to students, especially if you can purchase enough politicians. This isn’t a first for Ohio either. We’ve gone through similar scandals with corrupt charter school operators like White Hat Management and Horizon Science Academy. And it’s not just the operators either. We’ve seen corruption in the Ohio Department of Education with a director of school choice resigning after altering evaluations for charter school operators.

Call to Action

Now that you have the story, I’d like to ask you to do two things.

First, share the ECOT story with the people you know. I don’t believe the ECOT scandal has received nearly the media attention it deserves in Ohio, especially in terms of the overall culture and beliefs of the politicians at the top who’ve created this mess.

Second, contact your state representative and/or state senator and ask them where they stand on charter schools, especially online charter schools. If your representative or senator took money from ECOT, ask them what ECOT wanted in return. Also ask them why Andrew Brenner is still chair of the House Education Committee.

Third, elect politicians who believe in education over corporate special interests.

The problem isn’t just these charter operators and it isn’t just the Ohio Department of Education. It starts at the top with the people in charge.

What we want are politicians who prioritize education over corporate special interests. This November, use education as a litmus test for politicians because these are the people in charge. As long as you still have the corrupt culture in place, White Hat will just be replaced by Horizon Science Academy which will be replaced by ECOT ad infinitum. The Ohio Department of Education (DOE) will throw the charter school operators under the bus and the charter operators will blame the DOE, using publicly funded commercials if they have to, and nothing will change.

Investigate your state representatives and senators and elect politicians who believe in education and a strong investment in education this Fall.

David Akadjian is the author of The Little Book of Revolution: A Distributive Strategy for Democracy (print or ebook).