Keep in mind that, without the efforts of a few whistleblowers and the Times-Picayune's willingness to publish their complaints (even if they did this during the late Friday - early Saturday dead end of the news cycle), Abramson's charter was about to be renewed despite everything.
In fact, state auditors had already turned up startling deficiencies at Abramson. The records they kept of unannounced visits to the campus, as well as interviews with former teachers, paint a chaotic scene: classrooms without instructors for weeks and even months at a time, students who claimed their science fair projects had been done by teachers, a single special-needs instructor for a school of nearly 600.
Dunbar -- having declined to take money from Akpinar -- recommended more than a year ago that the state board of education yank Abramson's charter.
But the board ultimately stopped short of closing down the school, giving it a year to shape up under a "corrective action plan."
So let's hear it. Explain to me how the charter school system harnesses the power of "free enterprise" to make corruption and incompetence go away. Other than through bribery, I mean.
On a follow-up visit to the school, Dunbar was told that representatives from both the Cosmos Foundation and Atlas Texas had arrived and wanted to meet with him.
"They proceeded to shower me with compliments, to the extent that it made me feel uncomfortable," Dunbar wrote. Akpinar, the vice president from Atlas Texas, even contacted Dunbar after the meeting to see if they could get drinks that evening.
"I declined," he wrote.
After persistent requests, Dunbar said he agreed to meet her at the Starbucks on Magazine Street, where Akpinar offered $25,000 to help "fix this problem," Dunbar wrote. He recalled explaining that it would be a conflict of interest for a state official to take money from the school.
She responded that he would "only need to advise them," adding, "You are the only one who can help us."
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