The Ohio board of education last week voted to order the state’s largest full-time online charter school to repay $60 million in state aid. The vote is the result of a state audit of software-login records that determined the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow had dramatically overstated its enrollment.
The school has subsequently filed a lawsuit, arguing that board members violated state public-meetings law by voting without hearing public comment or substantive deliberation on the matter.
ECOT was paid for 15,322 full-time students during the 2015-16 school year, but state officials say they could document just 41 percent of that total.
