SALEM — Three proposed charter schools — not four — are vying to serve students from Salem next year.
The state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education confirmed yesterday that, because of a typographical error, it had incorrectly identified the Lynn Preparatory Charter School as seeking students from Salem, as well as Lynn.
The proposed K-8 school is intended only for Lynn students, according to Mark Hathaway, one of the charter school founders.
"We will not be drawing from Salem at all," said Hathaway, also a founder of The Hathaway School, a private school in Swampscott. "After all our Lynn seats are filled through the lottery system, students from other towns can apply, but our drawing is from Lynn."
Three proposed charter high schools have filed proposals with the state to serve at-risk students from Salem:
The Salem School Department, which would open a downtown Salem Community Charter School to serve 100 students.
Road to Success Charter High School, which would serve 320 students from Salem and Lynn. (The group applied for a charter last year but did not get one. It has since removed Peabody from its proposal.).
Richard Milburn Academy, which wants to serve 250 students from Salem and Lynn.
The city already has one charter school, Salem Academy, which opened in 2004 and enrolls more than 300 students in grades six through 12.
Salem is affected by a new law impacting school districts with the lowest MCAS scores in the state.
The education reform law, passed earlier this year, allows charter school spending to double in districts where MCAS scores are in the bottom 10 percent of the state, and Salem falls into that category.
Charter schools are independent, publicly funded schools that operate under five-year charters granted by the state Board of Education.
Hathaway, whose group is applying to open Lynn Preparatory Charter School, currently operates The Hathaway School with his wife, Joanne Civitarese.
Last year, Hathaway and Civitarese, who live in Ipswich, applied to open Lynn Preparatory Charter School and made it to the final round. But Education Commissioner Mitchell Chester pulled his recommendation before the board voted because the state believed the founders would close the Hathaway School if the Lynn charter were granted.
"A private school cannot become a charter school," Department of Elementary and Secondary Education spokesman JC Considine said this week.
Considine cited charter school regulations, which state that "private and parochial schools shall not be eligible for charter school status," and that private schools can't seek charter status for the "purpose of securing public funding."
Hathaway said he and his wife are not converting their private school, on Blaney Street in Swampscott, into a publicly funded school.
"We're physically bringing the school back to Lynn," Hathaway said. "Your teachers have to reapply and the students go into a lottery. I can't drag my parents over who have patronized us for the last seven years. They go into a hat — there is no cherry-picking and bringing your kids over."
If the charter is granted and it affects enrollment at Hathaway School, however, "the private school would probably be fazed out," Hathaway said.
The Hathaway School mainly serves students from Lynn, with a small number of students from Swampscott, Saugus, East Boston and Salem, according to Hathaway.
Charter school funding would allow them to double what they spend on students at the private school, he said.
"There would be more services for the children, more teachers, probably we'd expand our programming," Hathaway said. "We'd probably have money to add full-scale music and full-scale art. We could expand everything, we believe."
In all, 42 groups submitted prospectuses to the state for this charter school application cycle. In a matter of weeks, the state is expected to invite some of those groups to submit a full application, due Nov. 1.
The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education will vote to award new charters in February.
Staff writer Amanda McGregor can be reached at amcgregor@salemnews.com.
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