Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition

SCHOOL

- Dsweeney@sunsentine­l.com, 954-356-4605 or Twitter @Daniel_Sweeney

to win by the Democratic Party and was one of 13 state legislativ­e races in which President Barack Obama made an official endorsemen­t on Friday.

Gonzalez Petkovich has made a habit of comparing Doral College to Trump University, the series of real-estate seminars under the Donald Trump brand that are the subject of lawsuits in New York and California.

“Doral College is taking public money to offer a service that is useless,” she said. “I’m not anti-charter school, but let’s do this in a way that’s fair and benefits everybody instead of this farce. A politician shouldn’t be making money off our kids and taxpayers.”

Doral College is on the campus of Doral Academy Charter High School, which was initially the only feeder school to the college. But last year, four schools, all managed by Academica, sent students there. This year, it’s up to a dozen and enrollment has grown from 146 in the 2013-2014 school year to 862 this year.

The college is unique nationwide, according to Adam Lowe, the executive director of the National Alliance of Concurrent Enrollment Partnershi­ps.

“Early college high schools are a blending of the college and high school experience,” Lowe said. “About a third of those exist on a high school campus rather than on a college campus. But those sites are branch campuses of an establishe­d college or university. So you’re not establishi­ng the college yourself, you’re partnering with a university whose courses you’re delivering.”

Lowe could think of only one example nationwide in which a college catered solely to high school students, Simon’s Rock in Massachuse­tts. That school is affiliated with Bard College, ranked as the 49th best liberal arts college in the country in the latest “U.S. News and World Report” rankings.

“It is highly unusual and it would be something that I would consider should be proceeded with extreme caution since you’re dealing with a nonaccredi­ted college that services solely high school students,” Lowe said. “It’s sort of a backward attempt at a college.”

Charter schools are privately owned but funded with taxpayer dollars. The schools run by Academica, Florida’s oldest charter school management company, use public funds to pay Doral College to provide unaccredit­ed college coursework. The largest contributo­r is Doral Academy itself, which sent $712,000 to Doral College in 2014-15, financial records show.

Since 2011, Doral Academy has given more than $1.8 million to Doral College, far more than any other school, and the amount spent has grown each year.

Under Florida House rules, his employment by a charter school company while also pushing for laws beneficial to charter schools is not a conflict of interest. Under the rules, a conflict only arises when a law specifical­ly benefits a single company rather than an entire industry.

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