Wings of flight charter clipped

A charter school aiming to teach middle school students about space and aviation is being grounded by the Cherry Creek School District because organizers of the Colorado Skies Academy inflated the school’s enrollment numbers, the district said.

The charter school’s organizers, however, say it’s all a misunderstanding, and they plan to work with the Cherry Creek district to find a way to open in August.

The school’s planned curriculum includes designing experiments to be tested by researchers on the International Space Station, as well as building and launching gliders, and simple and complex rockets. Organizers pitched the school as a training ground for a new generation of pilots and astronauts.

It was scheduled to open on 15 acres at Centennial Airport that are part the Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum’s second location. The school’s backers include several key figures in aviation, including former Aurora Public Schools Superintendent John Barry, a former combat pilot and CEO of Wings Over the Rockies.

But Cherry Creek Superintendent Scott Siegfried said last week that only 24 students were lined up to attend the school at its scheduled opening. That number is significantly less than the 196 names of students the school submitted during its initial bid to open as a charter school.

“The significant discrepancy between these numbers suggests that CSA misrepresented its numbers during the application process,” Siegfried said in a letter to the charter school’s board that also nixed the school’s charter.

An enrollment of 24 is wholly inadequate for Colorado Skies Academy to succeed as a charter school, Siegfried said. Also, the charter school did not submit the proper forms showing a student’s intent to enroll by the Nov. 15 deadline, Siegfried said. This prompted Siegfried to call the school’s submission bid to open as a charter “inadequate and unsatisfactory” and excused the Cherry Creek school board from authorizing the school’s charter.

A charter school is a public school that operates independently from a central district office. Colorado Skies Academy would have been only the third charter school in the Cherry Creek district.

The school can reapply next year, said district spokeswoman Abbe Smith: “They have to submit the proper intent-to-enroll forms and to show evidence they have enough students to support opening the school.”

Colorado Skies Academy leaders said they want to work with the school district to ensure it can still open in August. Board President Steve Goodman said the problems cited by Siegfried were only a misunderstanding.

“I think there is a different interpretation between intent to enroll and an interest in enrolling,” Goodman said.

“The school has nearly 200 intent-to-enroll forms from local parents, and more are being submitted every day.”