Limestone Charter Association reports rapid growth, highlights oversight and educator supports

Miss Malone, representing Limestone Charter Association, told the K‑12 Finance Subcommittee that the authorizer has grown quickly since its July 2021 establishment and now oversees 13 schools with six additional schools scheduled to open next year.

Limestone reported enrollment growth approaching 8,000 students — a roughly 48% increase in the past year, the presenter said. She highlighted local and national recognition for member schools, including a Milken Family Foundation award received by a teacher at Coastal High School and Orangeburg High School for Health Professions’ construction of a roughly $14,000,000 expansion to serve more students.

The association also described systemwide academic gains: Limestone said its district met the state’s 75% proficiency goal for the English II end‑of‑course test and that one of its schools, HSHP, reported a 98% graduation rate among its students in the Interstate‑95 corridor with substantial postsecondary transitions.

Miss Malone described authorizer practice for reviewing transfer requests from other authorizers. She said Limestone uses third‑party vetting of operations, academics and governance and reviews EMO and CMO contracts before recommending transfers. “We ask for any notices of noncompliance, any notices of corrective action, any litigation, anything that we can get our hands on, and we make a holistic decision,” she said.

She said the authorizer requires schools to post budgets and transactions involving management organizations, reviews management contracts annually and requests updated contracts when material changes occur. She added that the authorizer will respect statutory closure requirements, including automatic closure rules when triggered by law.

Limestone also discussed educator supports: the association provides master’s‑degree programs for member‑school educators in project‑based learning, teacher leadership or STEM in return for a three‑year service agreement to remain at their school. Miss Malone said the goal is to build leadership capacity and retain teachers.

The subcommittee asked for more detail about unsatisfactory schools. Miss Malone said two schools in the portfolio were rated unsatisfactory; one school that transferred in had two consecutive unsatisfactory ratings but had shown upward trends in middle‑school performance after targeted support. She said Limestone treats corrective action as supportive and evaluates the trajectory when deciding whether to close an individual school or a single program within a multi‑school campus.

The presentation closed with committee members thanking Limestone for the briefing and offering follow‑up questions about specific transfer cases and oversight practices.