Ben Chavis (educator)

Doctor Benford "Ben" Chavis [1] is an American educator known for his leadership at the American Indian Public Charter School (AIPCS) in Oakland, California and its expanded American Indian Model Schools system, serving from 2001 into 2012. He is a national leader in the education reform movement, emphasizing a conservative philosophy of discipline and accountability. From Robeson County, North Carolina, Chavis received a doctorate in education from the University of Arizona, was a tenure-track professor in 1988 at San Francisco State University, and he served as the superintendent of schools at the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in Arizona before working in Oakland.

Chavis was very successful at AIPCS in raising performance and enrollment, but generated controversy for his methods.[2] In addition, he was found by a 2011 Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) audit to have directed an estimated $3.8 million to businesses owned by him and his wife, without authorized contracts and in a conflict of interest. He resigned from the school in 2012 and returned to North Carolina. In 2015, he was still under investigation by the FBI and IRS. In March 2017, he was indicted and arrested in North Carolina on six felony counts for money laundering and mail fraud associated with activities at AIPCS. He was assigned a federal public defender.[3]

Chavis was featured in the documentary film Flunked (2008). He is the author of Crazy Like a Fox; One Principal's Triumph in the Inner City (2009).[4][5]

Early life and education

Born Benford Chavis, the eldest of six children in a poor Lumbee Indian family in Robeson County, North Carolina, he was soon called "Ben", a nickname he has used all his life. He had a difficult relationship with his alcoholic father, who died when he was young. His mother remarried. None of his parents had much formal education, but Chavis said his stepfather taught him discipline, how to work hard, and to be accountable, a philosophy he applied as an educator.[6]

Chavis attended local segregated public schools, where he was most interested in sports. He accepted a track scholarship by Oklahoma City University. Two years in, he was offered an academic scholarship by the University of Arizona, and transferred there, majoring in education. He thought at the time that the field would offer easy conditions.[6] Chavis graduated with a bachelor's degree in education; he had worked part-time as a school janitor to help pay for it. He continued to study, working on a master's degree through night classes at Northern Arizona University. Later he completed a doctorate at the University of Arizona, in education, with what he said were concentrations in philosophy and anthropology.[6]

Career
Main articles: AIPCS and American Indian Model Schools

In 1988, Chavis became a tenure-track professor in the ethnic studies department at San Francisco State University. In 2000, he was working as superintendent of schools at the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in Arizona.[6]

That year he was recruited by a representative of Oakland's Native American community for the position of principal at the struggling American Indian Public Charter School in Oakland, starting in 2001. By 2005, he had succeeded in dramatically raising scores of the middle school students and increasing enrollment at the school.

Chavis had generated considerable controversy by his methods. He was criticized by some parents and faculty for harsh treatment and verbal abuse of students and teachers.[7] Chavis zealously mocked liberal orthodoxy and was praised by conservatives such as columnist George Will and Andrew Coulson of the Cato Institute.[8] The school claimed to be just as intolerant of unions as it was of drug dealers, and prided itself on firing under-performing teachers.[7]

He worked with the school's board in 2007 to respond to community demand for more classes, and they added another middle school, AIPCS II, and a high school, AIPHS, under a new charter organization known as the American Indian Model Schools (AIMS) system.

While Chavis stepped down as head of the schools in summer 2007, the board asked him to serve in an executive, consulting role, and he was active in the schools' affairs.[6] A K-4 elementary school was added to AIPCS II in 2012. During these years, the AIM system student body had a growing proportion of African American, Asian and Latino students, with American Indians comprising a smaller percentage. Chavis resigned all ties in January 2012. By the 2012 school year, some 90 percent of the AIMS students were ethnic Asian. Some critics of the system attributed the high scores of the system schools to the make-up of the student body, known for a culture that demanded high performance.

Former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called Chavis’s results an “education miracle.”[9]

California state "extraordinary audit"

Chavis resigned all ties at the school system in January 2012 and returned to North Carolina, where he had been resident again for some time. After the results of an "extraordinary audit" by the California financial management system were released later in 2012, Chavis was strongly criticized for allegedly receiving more than $3.8 million in school funds for directing school payments to his and his wife's business without authorized contracts, from 2006 -2010. In addition, the board of the charter school system was criticized for lax accounting and financial mismanagement.[10]

The audit "also documented more than $25,000 in unauthorized credit-card purchases by Chavis from 2009 to 2011, including $295 for Giants tickets and charges for restaurants in other states, airfare, hotels and items from stores in North Carolina, where Chavis lived at the time."[10]

Following the results of the audit and other investigations of Chavis related to treatment of students and faculty, in February 2013, OUSD revoked the school's charter.[11]

After Chavis' resignation, the school appealed the revocation and struggled for the next year to keep its charter. It gained a preliminary injunction from the Superior Court of Alameda County allowing it to continue to operate the three system schools.[12] AIMS has since received a 5-year renewal of the charter.

During the next 2 1/2 years, the charter school system paid Chavis an additional $8.6 million to lease buildings which he owned in Oakland, because it was unable to find other spaces for its operations.[13]

In North Carolina Chavis started a camp on his property to help students improve their math scores.[3] It was modeled on the SAIL program used in California schools.

In January 2017, he claimed to help orchestrate a change in the county's school board. He said he had encouraged the firing of Superintendent Tommy Lowray of the Public Schools of Robeson County and the effort by six board members to hire Virginia-based educator Thomas Graves. Lowry filed a lawsuit against the board charging they had violated their own hiring policy in trying to hire Graves.[3]

March 2017 Federal indictments

Chavis was indicted on March 30, 2017, by the federal government on six felony counts of money laundering and mail fraud; the case was filed in federal district court in San Francisco, California. The charges relate to his receiving federal grant money from 2006 to 2012 for the charter schools in Oakland, and his allegedly misusing the money in order to make lease payments on property he owned. The charges say that he benefited by $1.1 million on his transactions, as the schools made payments on property he owned, in what were illegal conflict-of-interest transactions. He was arrested and taken into custody in Wilmington, North Carolina. He will be assigned a federal public defender, as he says he cannot afford counsel, and would have been tried in California.[3][14]

However, as of April 2019, all financial mismanagement charges against Chavis have been dropped. Chavis has pleaded guilty to an unrelated charge and has received 12 months probation as a result.[15]

Representation in other media

Chavis was among reform educators featured in the documentary Flunked (2008), directed by Corey Burres, about the failures of the United States public school systems and efforts in educational reforms.

References
  1. Hayley Burgess, Managing Editor Dr. Chavis: Lumbees have 'lust for life' spring 2011 UNC Pembroke
  2. "Former Educator Embraces 'Crazy' Teaching Style", NPR, 8 September 2009
  3. "Chavis indicted for money laundering and mail fraud", The Robesonian, 30 March 2017
  4. Mitchell Kapor, Review: Crazy Like a Fox, by Ben Chavis, San Francisco Chronicle, 13 September 2009
  5. Katy Murphy, "Top Performing Oakland Charter School could close amid allegations of fraud", Mercury News, 02 April 2012; accessed 6 May 2017
  6. Simone Sebastian, "Principal's philosophy shaped by upbringing, formal education", San Francisco Chronicle, 16 December 2005
  7. Landsberg, Mitchell (May 31, 2009). "Spitting in the eye of mainstream education". Los Angeles Times.
  8. Will, George (August 21, 2008), "Where Paternalism Makes the Grade", The Washington Post
  9. Tucker, Jill (2019-05-01). "Controversial charter school director avoids jail after fraud charges dropped". SFGate. Retrieved 2020-02-19.
  10. Ben Boychuk "Ben Chavis’s Last Stand", City Journal, Summer 2013
  11. "Oakland's American Indian Model Schools seek new charter", Oakland Tribune
  12. Kwamilele, Tasion. "American Indian Model Schools to Remain Open". Oakland North. UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism. Retrieved 29 July 2013.
  13. Bay Area News Group, "High drama as Oakland charter school cuts ties with unsavory past", East Bay Times, 24 May 2015; accessed 05 May 2017
  14. Jill Tucker, "Former Oakland charter schools director charged with fraud", San Francisco Chronicle, 30 March 2017; accessed 5 May 2017
  15. Riley, Jason L. (2019-04-30). "Opinion | A Charter-School Principal Won't Go to Prison". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2020-02-19.
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