After questions, OCPS extends enrollment-recovery contract with CASE; board seeks verification

Orange County Public Schools trustees on Dec. 9 voted to continue a performance-based contract with CASE (sometimes referred to as Casa K12) after a multi-hour discussion that pressed staff and the vendor on attribution, cost and student retention.

Member Ferrant moved the item from consent for public discussion and expressed concern about per-student costs and whether the district could perform this marketing work in-house. "If we get roughly around $9,000 from the state to educate a child, and then we use a company like CASE that come in and they take $935 for a student, ... I have a lot of angst with this," she said, asking for clearer verification of outcomes.

Superintendent Maria Vasquez and CASE representatives explained that CASE works on a performance contract and that their outreach focused on a district-provided list of families who previously were enrolled in OCPS or who had left for alternatives. Adrian Bunn, CASE president, said the firm recovered approximately 1,900 students and that the district paid roughly $1.8 million; the district estimated the recovered students translated to approximately $13 million in FTE revenue. "We actually recovered approximately 1,900," Bunn said, and described the vendor's outreach model (multiple phone/text/email attempts, weekend and evening contact windows, on-site visits and a CRM to log outreach).

Board members repeatedly asked how many of the enrollments represented net-new families versus those already identified on district lists, how retention is being tracked (30-day and beyond), and what the raw reasons were for families who declined to return. Member Ferrant asked whether the district could incentivize district staff instead, or bring the work in-house; staff and several trustees responded that principals and school staff are already overburdened and that CASE provides specialized capacity and seven-day outreach hours that would be costly to replicate.

Trustees asked staff to provide the board with more detailed verification, including raw CRM exports and retention counts, and to present regular updates on the recovered cohort. After discussion, the board approved moving forward with CASE for at least another year; the vote was recorded as passing unanimously. Board members emphasized the need for monthly reporting and data access to assess net impact and to ensure resources are deployed efficiently.

The contract's continuation will let staff and the vendor refine messaging, document reasons families did or did not return, and evaluate whether district processes or school-site changes can sustain enrollments once families return.

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