Maven Academy Charter School application withdrawn to build more community support

Plans for the Maven Academy Charter School in Freeport have been put on hold after its application was temporarily withdrawn — with the intention of once again applying at a future time after attempting to build more community support.

According to Craig Mercado, the head and prospective principal of Maven Academy, the decision to pull the application is a necessary step to ensure broader community backing for the proposed charter school.

“We felt we needed more groundswell support,” Mercado said of the decision, with he and his team having withdrawn the application on Thursday, Aug. 21, the day before Freeport Public Schools had a public hearing scheduled to discuss the proposed charter school.

The hearing was subsequently cancelled.

The withdrawal comes after the Maven Academy team recognized the need for more robust outreach efforts.

“We need to do a better job at getting the people excited about a charter school,” he said. “We always anticipated the need for more outreach… (seeing that there was a group in Freeport that was anti-charter schools) we realized we needed to do a better job at getting people excited about a charter school.”

“It’s a withdrawal, not a permanent thing,” he added. “Schools withdraw almost every year.”

The State University of New York, which handles charter school applications, will provide feedback on Maven’s application.

However, Mercado declined to commit to a specific time frame when Maven Academy would resubmit its application.

In addition to building community support, Mercado said he wanted to address misconceptions about the planned charter school, which doesn’t as of yet have a specified location. He added that the charter school would not be anti-union, nor would it be for-profit or a religious institution, which were all statements he had read online, where the issue was being discussed.

“A charter school can’t be those things,” Mercado said. “SUNY wouldn’t approve a for-profit school, their mission is to open public schools.”

Mercado, while addressing the resistance among supporters of the Freeport School District’s position as the sole public school option in the area, pointed out the need for improvement in the district’s math proficiency levels.

“I mean, if you look eighth grade, 2023, 17% of those students were proficient in math… they think that that’s acceptable? I don’t, but maybe they do,” stated Mercado.

“That’s what they’re so against,” he said. “They’re so against competition for results.”

As Maven Academy prepares to potentially reapply, the charter school team will focus on engaging more deeply with the Freeport community to garner the necessary support.

Mercado acknowledged that this process would take time, but he expressed confidence in the team’s approach.

“(The) whole process is very long,” Mercado said. “And so everything has to be sort of taken one step at a time.”

Speaking as a private citizen, Freeport village attorney Howard Colton expressed his opposition to the notion of a charter school in Freeport.

“I’m not in favor of charter schools,” said Colton, whose children have attended Freeport public schools. “What happens is it still decreases the amount of money and aid that would go to the public school.”

He expressed concerns that such funding cuts could lead to fewer teachers and diminished programs in public schools.

Colton, whose mother and father both worked as public school teachers, disagreed with arguments often made by charter school supporters, who claim that charter schools don’t take money away from public schools.

“The charter school argument is, well, it really doesn’t make a difference,” he said. “Because any kid, any child that goes to their school, that money that would normally go, say, for example, to the Freeport public schools, would then go to the charter school. And they say it’s a wash.”

“It really isn’t,” Colton added. “Because what happens is it still decreases the amount of money and aid that would go to the public school.”

According to Colton, diverting students and funds to charter schools ultimately harms the public school system by forcing it to cut programs and reduce staff.

“Anytime you take money away from the public school system, the money has to be made up somehow,” he said.

“It’s something that I just don’t think would be a good fit for Freeport,” Colton said of a charter school.

Proponents of charter schools would disagree with Colton’s analysis, with Maven’s own FAQ reading: “Charter school students are removed from public school enrollment, and the per-pupil funding for those students is then directed to the charter school. The community is paying the same cost for the child’s education, and the local public school continues to be funded for every child it educates.”

Freeport school officials did not respond to a request for comment about the withdrawal of Maven’s application.