The Texas Legislative Budget Board selected Evergreen Solutions to complete a comprehensive pilot charter review of the Meyer Park, Southwest School, and Kandy Stripe charter schools. The review served to develop and test policies and procedures that evaluate the quality of services provided by Charter holders and to develop accomplishments, findings, and recommendations that improve the quality of services provided by the Charter holder. The pilot identified strategies to improve charter operations, identified opportunities to reduce costs, and highlight exemplary programs. Results of the pilot, including tools and methodologies, were used in future reviews of Texas charter schools.
Evergreen focused the review of charter schools on five core functional areas, including educational service delivery; charter leadership, organization and management; financial, asset/risk and purchasing management; safety and security; and facilities planning, use, and management. Evergreen worked closely with LBB to develop prototype materials to review each of these areas, including surveys and or on-site visits and guides. Upon completion of the prototype review materials, Evergreen assessed the operation of each charter school and provide specific findings and recommendations for areas where issues were identified. Each recommendation was accompanied by a five-year fiscal impact. The end result was a finalized methodology to review Texas charter schools in the future, the accompanying tools to perform a review, and a report on the review of operations at Meyer Park, Southwest School, and Kandy Stripe using these methodologies and tools.