Eddie Goodall may have stepped out of the NC charter school media spotlight but he still lurks just behind the curtain. Early February the NC Public Charter Schools Association made a big to-do about Goodall stepping down as executive director and handing the reigns to Lee Teague. Goodall had been president of the NC Alliance for Public Charter Schools before leaving to set up and lead the NC Public Charter Schools Association as a competing group. Goodall’s departure was apparently intended to help the two groups, and others, mend fences.
“I think more people will step in the void when I step out,” Goodall said
But Goodall hasn’t gone far. In November he and Teague had already filed incorporation papers for a non-profit called the Association for Charter Education, intended to operate as a 527 political group. On February 11 they filed a notice with the IRS establishing 527 status for the Association for Charter Education, located at Goodall’s Weddington address. Teague is listed as the custodian of books in Raleigh, with Goodall as a director, along with directors Jennifer Lucas of Hillsborough and Justin Matthews of Charlotte.
Lucas is Managing Director of Voyager Academy in Durham and listed on the NC Charter Schools Association website as chair of that group’s board. Matthews is Chief Operating Officer of Mountain Island Charter School. Matthews achieved some notoriety as head of a Florida charter school for pushing back against corporate management company Imagine Schools of Virginia. A settlement left Imagine in control and Matthews out of a job. Together Lucas and Matthews operate Alliance Education Services, a charter consulting entity.
No financial reports have yet been filed for the Association for Charter Education. As a new 527 group it clearly intends to influence the politics of public education in 2016. Who will fund that influence remains to be seen.
gregflynn 