Proposed North Shore area charter school application denied

Alec Johnson, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
·3 min read
North Shore Classical Academy, a proposed public charter school, had its application denied by the Wisconsin Office of Educational Opportunity.
North Shore Classical Academy, a proposed public charter school, had its application denied by the Wisconsin Office of Educational Opportunity.

A state agency has denied an application to form a charter school in the North Shore area.

In a statement on the school's website, North Shore Classical Academy founder Cheryle Rebholz said the Wisconsin Office of Educational Opportunity's Advisory Council denied the school's application. She also said that "at this time, there is no appeal process."

"The real losers affected by this news are the school families who want another option for their children, as well as the professionals who work in the school systems," Rebholz said in her statement.

Rebholz declined an interview request when reached by phone. Sid Terry, who was listed in an October 2022 video as the school's vice president, has not responded to phone calls requesting an interview.

In a letter to North Shore Classical Academy officials, Vanessa Moran, the University of Wisconsin System's Office of Educational Opportunity director, said the school's application "was lacking the necessary detail in each of the five sections of the application to demonstrate that the school would be able to open successfully."

"While a planning year is required of all teams prior to opening the doors to students, that time is to operationalize the various components outlined in the Phase II Application. While all the various details and individual components are not expected to be finalized at this stage in the process, the OEO Advisory Council did not feel that the application had developed those plans to the extent they needed to be at this point," said Moran in her letter.

Rebholz said in her statement one option open to the school would be to reapply. "At this point in time, however, this path is not viable as the political climate and pressure is not in favor of the school choice movement; the November midterm elections bared this out," said Rebholz in her statement. "A realistic path forward is currently being worked on, and we please ask you to stand by as the NSCA board pivots from this news and reconvenes with an alternative action plan."

The school had planned to use a curriculum based on Michigan-based Hillsdale College's classical education curriculum focused on four core subjects of literature, history, science and math. It also would have offered students four pathways for career choices: college preparation, career technical education, military leadership and entrepreneurship.

Rebholz was one of four candidates who ran as part of an unsuccessful effort in November 2021 to recall four incumbent Mequon-Thiensville School Board members. Rebholz was also a Mequon-Thiensville School Board member from 2012 to 2015 and is a business owner. She runs Bear Arms Boutique Shooting Range and beauty salon Faces II, both located in Mequon.

Charter schools are public schools that have more freedom in exchange for more accountability, according to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction. They can be authorized by a public school district or an approved independent authorizer.

Since North Shore Classical Academy was proposed as an independent charter school, it had to be authorized by an independent authorizer, which is what the UW System's Office of Educational Opportunity is.

The first phase of the application process was completed in April 2022, according to the academy's website, and the school had been going through the second phase of the application process. That Phase 2 application was due in November 2022.

The school's website said the school wanted to serve students in Brown Deer, Cedarburg, Grafton, Mequon, communities feeding into the Nicolet School District and Thiensville.

Contact Alec Johnson at (262) 875-9469 or alec.johnson@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @AlecJohnson12.

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Proposed North Shore area charter school application denied