In a contentious Thursday evening decision, the Montgomery County school board voted to close the county’s only charter school, MECCA Business Learning Institute (MBLI), at the end of this academic year if it doesn’t resolve ongoing issues — a decision that comes just nearly seven months after the school opened.
“I think this is just a bunch of bull,” said board Vice President Brenda Wolff after presenting a resolution, which failed, that would have given the school until December to solve the issues. “I’m very disappointed in some of this discussion because we don’t have all of our schools that are successful in our own system, and we don’t give them three months to improve.”
The board voted 5-2 to approve a resolution based on Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) Superintendent Thomas Taylor’s December recommendation to begin formal proceedings for revoking MBLI’s charter. The recommendation to revoke the charter earned 5 votes from board members Rita Montoya, Laura Stewart, Julie Yang, Karla Silvestre and Student Member of the Board Anuva Maloo…