Gulen Charter School You Are Next- FBI raids on Charter Schools

Search warrant reveals the details of the Horizon Science Academy FBI Raid

Concept Search Warrant

http://politics.suntimes.com/article/chicago/search-warrants-reveal-details-fbi-raid-concept-schools/mon-07212014-622pm The recent FBI raid at the Des Plaines headquarters of Concept Schools focused on many of the politically connected charter-school operator’s top administrators and companies with close ties to Concept, according to federal documents obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times. Authorities last month said FBI agents carried out raids at 19 Concept locations in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio as part of an “ongoing white-collar crime matter” but declined to provide further details of their investigation. Copies of the search warrants that FBI agents served in Des Plaines and a subpoena seeking records show investigators went hunting for a wide range of documents pertaining to Concept president Sedat Duman, founder Taner Ertekin and other current and former executives of the fast-growing charter network. The investigators also sought documents about companies that were hired by Concept to perform work under the federal “E-Rate” program, which pays for schools to expand telecommunications and Internet access. Concept is linked to the Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, who lives in Pennsylvania, and has developed strong relationships with many local politicians, including state House Speaker Michael Madigan (D-Chicago). Four of Concept’s 30 publicly financed schools are in Illinois, including the 600-student Chicago Math and Science Academy in Rogers Park and two campuses that opened a year ago in the Austin and McKinley Park neighborhoods. Chicago Public Schools officials approved another two Concept schools on the South Side for the 2014-15 school year. For one of the two newest Concept sites, in Chatham, more than $528,000 in public funding was earmarked to pay rent for the coming school year to an arm of Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church. The church’s pastor, the Rev. Charles Jenkins, gave the invocation at Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s 2011 swearing-in and served on Emanuel’s transition team. Work on the Chatham project stopped recently, although Ald. Howard Brookins – who initially supported the new school in his 21st Ward – said Jenkins told him federal authorities were probing an outside vendor of the charter network and “not investigating Concept itself.” The federal documents obtained by the Sun-Times, however, reveal that the FBI is taking a close look at the operations of Concept. Federal law enforcement authorities in Cleveland, who are leading the probe, sent a grand-jury subpoena to Concept on May 30. The subpoena gave the charter chain’s administrators until June 17 to provide a long list of records. Concept did not receive the full time to turn over the records. Instead, shortly after 2 p.m. on June 4, a federal judge in Chicago approved three warrants to raid the charter network’s headquarters at 2250 E. Devon in the O’Hare Lake Office Complex. Later that day, after normal business hours, agents arrived at the office park in Des Plaines where Concept has three suites. The warrant gave agents the right to take any documents relating to Concept’s involvement in the E-Rate program as well as “all bank records,” “all general ledgers,” “all calendars,” “all documents related to employee travel” and “all telephone records, telephone lists and contact lists.” At 9:29 p.m. on June 4, a Concept executive gave the key to a storage unit on Mannheim Road in Des Plaines to FBI agent Brian Murphy. From the storage unit, the agent seized “48 boxes of vendor records, business records and documents,” records show. According to court records, investigators also were looking to take every record related to 13 Concept employees and companies. They included Duman, the current Concept president; chief information officer Huseyin Ulker, and Ertekin, who founded the charter chain in Ohio in the late 1990s. He now works in the United Arab Emirates, according to his online LinkedIn profile. The warrant goes on to specify that the federal agents wanted “all personnel documents for Huseyin Ulker and Sedat Duman, including but not limited to documents reflecting their compensation packages.” Among contractors mentioned in the warrant were: •Advanced Solutions for Education of Schaumburg and company founder Ozgur Balsoy, who used to be administrator of a Concept-run school in Columbus, Ohio. The company was the consultant to Concept on applications for E-Rate funding, according to the federal program’s records. •Arlington Heights-based Core Group Inc. and its president Ertugrul Gurbuz. Core is described in federal records as performing much of the work for Concept under the E-Rate program. •Signature Maker Inc. of Hoffman Estates and president Ergun Koyuncu. •Cambridge Technologies of Chesterland, Ohio and owner Stephen Draviam. Balsoy and Koyuncu declined to comment Monday, Gurbuz did not return calls, and Draviam said he had been contacted late last year by FBI agents. He said he provided records regarding E-Rate work his company performed for Concept more than five years ago, but the agents did not indicate the target of their investigation. The federal government's guidelines for E-Rate state that schools must choose companies to do work under the program through a "competitive bidding process" that is "open and fair." Vicki Anderson, a special agent in the FBI’s office in Cleveland, declined to comment on the warrants. At the time of the June 4 raids, Anderson had said all documents related to the investigation were sealed from public view. The Sun-Times obtained the warrants and other documents from the raid in Des Plaines through a state Freedom of Information Act request to Concept. Concept officials have said they were cooperating with the investigation and would not make any further comment.

Ex Teachers, Parents and Pupils of Horizon Science Academy tell of test cheating, sexual scandals and more

http://www.abc22now.com/shared/news/top-stories/stories/wkef_vid_21200.shtml Horizon Charter Schools Under Investigation DAYTON/COLUMBUS -- A federal investigation is underway concerning multiple instances of misconduct at 19 Horizon Science Academy charter schools in Ohio. Three of the schools being investigated are located in Dayton. A group of teachers from Horizon Science Academy Dayton High School attended the Ohio Board of Education meeting Tuesday, to share testimony about their allegations of school misconduct. "The stuff that went on here was so outrageous and absolutely unfair," said former Horizon teacher Kellie Kochensperger in an interview after the public hearing portion of the board meeting, "Unprofessional and completely beyond anything I thought a public school should have happening." "Some of the teachers here have used racial slurs when describing students," added Richard Storrick, who worked for the Dayton High School until June of 2013. The allegations don't stop at racial slurs, Kochensperger says she testified about sexual misconduct that she believes the administration hid from parents. "Oral sex, that took place outside of the cultural festival, an after school activity," Kochensperger said. She said the incident took place while she was working at the school, with a group of 6th and 8th grade students. Other students are alleged to have watched, and the incident was recorded on school surveillance cameras. Kochensperger says none of this was reported to parents, who were told that students were suspended for being out of school boundaries. "It's a publicly funded school, so everybody's tax dollars are funding everything we just talked about," Storrick vented. Teachers also allege they were instructed to improperly conduct state standardized tests, and not ask questions about it. "It says here in the book that they're supposed to have calculators," Kochensperger said about a conversation she had with a superior administrator during a testing day, "and he told me they don't need them, it's a science test not a math test." "With every bone in my body I thought if I filed a complaint with the Ohio Department of Education, if I filed a civil rights suit, if I did anything that would get back to [the Horizon] director I would be terminated and I would lose my job," said Storrick about the allegations of intimidation presented to the State Education Board. He added that's why the group of teachers who testified waited until they had found other teaching jobs to do so. About the state meeting today, board member Deborah Cain said, "We as a state board and as a department of education have got to get to the bottom of this. Every allegation must be investigated to its fullest." "Knowing that the kids are being cheated in the long run," Kochensperger said with frustration, "I'm very passionate about students in Ohio deserving better." Horizon Science Academy Dayton and it's parent company Concept Charter Schools did not respond to requests for comment on the investigation.

FBI Search and Seizure Expands to 19 Gulen Concept Schools

FBI, FCC and DOE expands search of documents related to e rate Technology grants  to multiple Gulen schools in Ohio and Indiana under their Concept Schools management.  
Here are some emergency e mails from the superintendent of Horizon Dayton Superintendant Ali Kucuker and Mrs. Lierly to the staff about what to say or not to say to parents, media, etc., 

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Federal authorities in Cleveland are examining an Illinois company that manages the local Horizon Science Academy schools and several others in the Midwest, and they have seized documents from several locations in the past week, including here in Ohio.

FBI agents in Cleveland, along with the U.S. Department of Education and the Federal Communications Commission, searched 19 locations, including three in Northern Ohio, regarding Concept Schools, according to interviews and published reports.

Vicki Anderson, an FBI agent in Cleveland, said the search warrants involved "a white-collar matter,'' but she would not specify. The search warrants are sealed.

Anderson said the case "did not involve violence or threats against the school, faculty or students.'' She would not identify the places searched.

The Indianapolis Business Journal reported last week that authorities are looking at financial records from schools managed by Concept Schools, an Illinois-based company.

Almost two-thirds of the 30 schools are in Ohio. Most are science and technology-themed schools, including several Horizon science academies in Northeast Ohio.



In addition to a highly regarded campus of an elementary, middle and high school near E. 60th Street and Interstate 90's Marginal Road, there is a Horizon elementary and middle school on Columbus and Denison avenues in Ohio City. 

Concept also runs Noble Academy at 1200 E. 200th St. in Euclid.



The federal education department named Horizon Science Academy in Cleveland a Blue Ribbon School in 2009, one of eight Ohio "Needles in a Haystack" - schools that succeed even in difficult urban areas.

In 2010, it was cited by the Thomas Fordham Institute. In 2011, the Ohio Department of Education made it one of 122 "Schools of Promise.''

Teachers and educators from across Concepts School were just in Cleveland in March for the network's annual STEM conference.

 On May 30, Eric Waldo, executive director of Michelle Obama's Reach Higher initiative, spoke at the school's graduation ceremony.

The Indianapolis Business Journal quoted a spokeswoman from an Indianapolis school, who said agents requested documents that were part of an audit the U.S. Department of Education was conducting of federal "e-rate'' grant programs.

"Earlier this week we were asked to provide information to U.S. Department of Education officials as part of a larger federal audit of e-rate technology grants," the school official said in a statement.

"Those officials indicated they are auditing the funds dispersed to various schools to verify that work paid for with e-rate grants was completed as reported.''

Plain Dealer reporter Patrick O'Donnell contributed reporting for this story.

http://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/index.ssf/2014/06/fbi_agents_in_cleveland_examin.html

 

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