As reported on the blog over the past several months, Rocketship Schools is in the process of opening a campus near Fort Totten metro station, known right now as simply Rocketship Fort Totten. Rocketship has two other campuses in DC, Rocketship Legacy Prep in Ward 7 and Rocketship Rise in Ward 8. Rocketship Rise has been in the news for a couple of terrible incidences in the past few months. We previously covered the lack of communication around an attempted kidnapping at Rocketship Rise, reported by Fox 5 DC news back in October 2019, right around the time when Rocketship was going before the DC Public Charter School Board seeking approval to open the Rocketship Fort Totten campus. This incident led community members to question Rocketship’s commitment to transparency and the safety of students (see minutes of ANC 4B’s November 2019 meeting). Rocketship leadership acknowledged it should have handled that situation in a better manner and stated its commitment to restoring parent trust.

On Feburary 24, 2020, Fox 5 DC news reported that the assistant principal at Rocketship Rise was charged with felony sex abuse in April 2019. The charges were not related to his duties as a school official, did not take place on the campus, and did not involve children. The news report made it sound as if the school knew about the charges but did not notify parents, and allowed the assistant principal to remain at the school until the media reported on it and only then placed him on leave.

I reached out to Angel McNeil, Founding Principal of the Rocketship Fort Totten campus, to get a sense of whether something was awry with Rocketship’s corporate leadership, whether they were not providing enough support to their schools in general, or if something was going on with leadership at Rocketship Rise where these problems were occurring. She asked to meet in person to share what Rocketship’s leadership is doing to address the situation and to share updates about the forthcoming campus.

She explained that neither Rocketship leadership at the school level nor at the corporate level actually knew about the charges until they were reported in the media. The reporter received a tip from someone. Once the school found out, the school placed the employee on leave and notified parents. According to Ms. McNeil, Rocketship school employees are supposed to self-report charges of the nature involved to their school. If the employee does not do so, though, then the school can easily remain unaware of serious charges involving the employee. If the arrest is not reported in the news or if the school does not peruse public arrest records on a regular basis, then the arrest and any subsequent charges could go undetected for some time. I looked up the court case. While the allegations are serious, they are not necessarily something that would be reported in local news, and as far as I can tell, the incident was not reported by local media when it happened.

On March 3, 2020, DC At-Large Councilmember Robert White introduced the Reporting Sexual Misconduct in Schools Amendment Act of 2020 (B23-0700). Reports on the bill described it as a bill that would require schools to notify parents when school employees are charged with sexual misconduct offenses. The bill proposes a number of reporting requirements to the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) of sexual misconduct incidences between school staff and students. The specific provision on notification states,

“OSSE, in consultation with schools, direct service providers, community partners, mental heatlh professionals, governmental and community-based sexual abuse experts, the Metropolitan Police Department, parents, and students shall develop a model policy for how LEAs report to the school community in a timely manner criminal investigations of sexual misconduct involving school staff.”

So the bill directs OSSE to develop a model notification policy, presumably for any criminal sexual misconduct investigation involving school staff, not just for a criminal investigation of sexual misconduct between school staff and students. But unless there is some means by which the schools themselves would timely become aware of such criminal investigations involving an employee, it is not clear how this bill would address a situation such as the one involving the assistant principal at Rocketship Rise. According to Ms. McNeil, in California, where Rocketship headquarters is located, there is a law that schools are automatically notified when school employees are arrested for certain crimes. No such law exists in DC, according to Ms. McNeil.

I went down the rabbit hole of looking at state laws on this issue. Lots of states have parental notification laws requiring schools to notify parents when a school employee is under investigation for certain offenses, but it looks like fewer states have notification laws in which the schools themselves are notified when school employees are arrested for certain offenses. In California, police are supposed to notify a school district when a school employee is arrested for a sexual offense. Even there though, the law simply says police notification is required if the police knows that the individual is a school employee. I do not know if people are regularly asked for employer information or if they are a school employee when they are arrested; perhaps they are. Closer to home, Virginia requires police and other individuals with the power to arrest, to report the arrest of an individual for certain offenses to the school superintendent if it is known or discovered that the individual is a school employee or adult student. In a few states, teachers are required to self-report and if they do not, it is a separate felony. In other states, courts or police use fingerprinting to do a search or otherwise must determine if the person arrested or charged is a teacher and notify the school system. Perhaps owing to different balances accorded to due process rights or perhaps what is allowed under collective bargaining agreements, there is a distinction in the states that require some sort of notification to the school system based on whether the person is actually charged or convicted or merely arrested.

Councilmember White’s recently introduced bill would amend the School Safety Omnibus Amendment Act of 2018. That law was enacted after an issue arose with background checks of employees of a widely utilized aftercare provider by DC schools. According to Ms. McNeil, due to the school safety omnibus law, employees who work with certain populations must undergo a background check annually, not just when they are hired. This includes school employees who work with children under 18 years of age. That will certainly be helpful in picking up criminal arrests and charges, but there could still be a problem if an employee is arrested for a serious crime in between background checks and fails to self-report.

Rocketship’s team is investigating its handling of the incident involving the assistant principal at Rocketship Rise and evaluating its policies to determine what more can be done to avoid similar situations in the future.

Rocketship Fort Totten

Turning to the forthcoming campus here in the neighborhood, Ms. McNeil shared that the new campus is on pace to reach target enrollment for its first year of operation beginning in fall 2020. Ms. McNeil estimates that a majority of the students will be Ward 4 or Ward 5 residents. There will be hard hat tours for families by appointment beginning this spring. Over the summer, the school plans to host community activities for neighbors and families to interact with the school. Last year, Ms. McNeil spent several months on the ground opening a Rocketship school in California. She is excited about opening the Rocketship Fort Totten campus and for the school to be an integral part of the larger community.