Tonight we convened a virtual meeting with Eric Doss from the Oklahoma Public School Resource Center. Mr. Doss is a wealth of wisdom and information regarding charter schools in Oklahoma. He provided an overview of the authorization process, a tutorial on state funding (which is not straight forward), and shared that OPSRC administers a federal grant program that provides selected charter schools with $900,000 of start-up funding. In addition, Mr. Doss made some recommendations and suggestions about how to get off on the right foot and reminded us that OPSRC provides charter start-up services free of charge.

It was a wonderful meeting that answered so many lingering questions. Of particular interest was identifying a state sponsor who might support our efforts. We discussed Tulsa Public Schools and their history of support for charter schools as well as non-district charter sponsors like state colleges and universities who can authorize charter schools in Tulsa and Oklahoma City.

We are very grateful to Mr. Doss and OPSRC and thankful to those who founded and support OPSRC. We can already tell they will be an invaluable resource in this endeavor.