Feds Award CA Charter Schools $10 Million to Build Charters in Under-Served Communities; Credit Enhancement Grant Will Address Critical Facilities Challenges, Create Opportunities for 9,000 Students in High-Quality Charter Schools.

LOS ANGELES -- The U.S. Department of Education yesterday announced that it has awarded the California Charter Schools Association $10 million to create the California Charter Building Fund. This fund will help alleviate one of the biggest impediments to the growth and sustainability of high-quality public charter schools, a lack of adequate facilities resources.

The Association will leverage this $10 million grant to raise a $100 million charter schools facility fund through a partnership with NCB Development Corporation. This project should create opportunities for an additional 9,000 students to attend a new or renovated charter school in a high-need area over the next five years. This grant will also help provide needed technical assistance to assist charter schools in the area of school facilities finance.

The fund will assist the creation of high-quality charter schools in communities with high concentrations of Program Improvement (PI) schools under No Child Left Behind (NCLB), as well as in districts serving low-income families. Schools will receive access to capital through the fund at rates that are better than is currently available.

"This generous grant provided by the Federal Department of Education will help ensure the creation of new, high-quality public charter schools in areas where they are most needed, in our under-served communities where demand for good public schools is greatest," said Caprice Young, CEO of the California Charter Schools Association. "This fund will help alleviate over-crowding for many of our non-charter public schools, while providing another public school choice for the many families that desperately need one."

"Charter schools must be able to grow and expand wherever the demand is greatest," said U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings yesterday, in a statement. "We must not allow a lack of space to become a barrier to parents and children stuck on long waiting lists. These grants will help communities open up new spaces to charter schools so that charter schools can open their doors to new students."

According to the U.S. Department of Education, the Association was one of five grantees of funds that will ultimately serve approximately 48,000 students in 120 charter schools, not only in California, but also in Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas and Washington, D.C.

This partnership between the California Charter Schools Association and the NCB Development Corporation builds on a previous partnership on a short-term loan program to high-quality and high-growth schools. This June, the Association announced the completion of its first year of the Charter School Growth Loan Fund, which went to growing charter schools that largely serve under-served urban communities. Through NCB Development Corporation's, and others' assistance, twenty two high-quality charter schools in California were able to take 2,132 students off waiting lists and allow them to enroll into classrooms this school year. 100 percent of the loans were repaid on time.

To date, the NCB Development Corporation has underwritten over $100 million, has lent over $60 million to charter schools in 12 states, and has an active pipeline of $120 million in charter transactions. With over eight years experience assisting charter schools, NCB Development Corporation has never experienced a loss on a charter school transaction.

About the California Charter Schools Association

The California Charter Schools Association is the membership and professional organization serving approximately 570 public charter schools serving close to 200,000 charter school students in the State of California. The Association's mission is to increase student achievement by strengthening and expanding public charter schools throughout California.