Natalia Alamdari | The News Journal

Jennifer Corbett, Wilmington

Charter school Design Thinking Academy will close its doors at the end of the school year.

The school’s board of directors voted to give up its charter on Thursday, citing declining enrollment and a struggle to recruit new students over the past two years.

“It was not an easy decision, but the Board does believe it was the ‘best’ decision,” said Paul Miller, chairman of the board, in an emailed statement.

The school, at 179 Stanton Christiana Road near Christiana, is no longer financially viable and fell below the minimum enrollment of 300 students required by its charter as of May 1, the board said in a statement on the school’s website. Students will attend classes through the end of the school year, and the senior class will still graduate.

With the decision coming at the end of the school year, students who had committed to the charter school next year are left scrambling to find an alternative. The state’s school choice deadline was in January, so the students are limited to schools within their feeder pattern or schools that still have openings.

The board advised that parents “immediately start thinking about what school your students will attend next year.”

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Diana Acevedo-Ureña, whose twin sons attend the school, said that aside from the announcement quietly posted on the school’s website, she hasn’t heard anything directly from the school about the closure. She found out through her sons, who found out through a teacher.

However, she said she was not surprised. Acevedo-Ureña starting having doubts about the school earlier in the year, when she noticed mass teacher turnover.

“When you start seeing a lot of people leaving all at once, you know what’s happening,” she said. “At the end of the day, it’s a business.”

When she attended an April board meeting where no one could give her a straight answer about graduation rates and the number of graduates who go on to attend college, she saw that as a red flag.

A week later, principal Stephanie Silverman, who assumed the role at the start of the school year, left to work at Archmere Academy, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Jennifer Corbett, The News Journal

Acevedo-Ureña had applied for school choice in January as a back-up plan for her sons. They’ll be attending A.I. du Pont High School next year. But not all parents were lucky enough to plan ahead.

Wendy Seichepine, whose son was planning to attend as a freshman next year, found out about the school’s closure after a friend told her Monday morning. They even had a shadow day scheduled for Thursday.

“I know school starts in either August or September, but it’s really not that much time. And now, you’re at the point where you’re like ‘Now I’ve only got what’s left,’” she said. “And then what about the kids that are already there? What if they’re on their junior year and thought they were going to spend their senior year there?”

The school hasn’t directly contacted Seichepine to inform her. Instead, she emailed a recruiter to set up a meeting about next steps.

Design Thinking Academy has seen a tumultuous four years since its opening.

In February 2017, co-founder and CEO Cristina Alvarez stepped down. Fellow co-founder and the school’s chief academic officer Martin Rayala followed suit.

The school officially cut ties with the two, citing differing visions for the school’s future and removing all references to Design-Lab Schools LLC, the legal entity created by Alvarez, from its charter. The board also accused Alvarez of improperly charging the school over $750,000 for services provided before it opened.

Shortly after, the school rebranded, changing its name from the Delaware Design Lab High School to Design Thinking Lab.

In 2016, the school was awarded a $10 million grant from the XQ Institute, which was intended to be paid in installments over five years.

“The award was never to be a one-time payment of $10 million to sit in the school’s coffers to do as they saw fit,” Miller said in a statement. “Over the past three years, XQ Institute did disburse a small portion of that funding award for specific XQ-mandated programs.”

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From 2018: Design Thinking Academy rebrands

While the state’s school choice application deadline has passed, affected students have “good cause” under the law to still apply to choice into another school for the next year, said Alison May, spokesperson for the Delaware Department of Education.

They would not be put ahead of any students on waiting lists, but would be offered seats at any school that currently has availability.