Doing the Old In-Out In-Out With Edison S.F.

Image by JohnB/UK

The San Francisco school board revoked the Edison Academy’s charter ten years ago, when it was run by the for-profit Edison Schools chain. Edison appealed with the California State Board of Education, won, and was back in operation. In the eight or so years since then, SFUSD has only dealt with the school to collect rent on its facilities. (The main reason Edison was able to get its charter approved in the first place was that Gap CEO Don Fisher stacked the school board with pro-Edison board members).

Last year, the school severed its ties to the for-profit Edison and applied for renewal of its charter as an indy charter. Everything was looking rosy for the new and improved Edison, with several school board members initially throwing their support behind it. It looked like Edison was going to be back in. However, the Budget Committee found several problems with their petition and eventually voted to recommend another denial. So for the time being it looks like Edison is out again.

Now Edison can resubmit their application or go straight to the State School Board, like their predecessor did. However, the new Brown board is not as much of a rubber stamp mill as the old board, so they may in fact be out for good.