by David Safier
As I've been saying recently, things are going to be hopping in the charter school arena during this school year. We're going to see more stories about charter schools as well as cries for changes, regulations and legislation. The big question is, where will those cries be coming from, and what will they be asking for?

Here's an early shot across the bow. The Arizona Charter Schools Association sent an email addressed to "Charter School Leaders" about a lawsuit it will be filing next week.

The email, which you can read by following the link at the end, is short on details. This is about as specific as it gets:

The email promises a website will be up soon with the details.

A bit of information about the Arizona Charter Schools Association is in order, to put its agenda, and the lawsuit, in context. ACSA is a non-governmental organization set up to support and assist the state's charter schools. I can't find any information on the website to say where its funding comes from, but based on what I know about these associations, most likely, lots of it comes from national organizations and foundations.

Judging from the people in charge, ACSA has a decidedly conservative slant. Here are 4 of the 8 members of its board of directors:

• Ken Bennett, AZ Secretary of State (Republican)
• Lisa Graham Keegan, Republican legislator who was a main sponsor of the 1994 charter schools legislation, then AZ Superintendent of Education who oversaw the birth of charter schools, and most recently McCain's educational advisor on his presidential campaign.
• Clint Bolick, head of Constitutional Litigation at the Goldwater Institute
• Jay Heiler, President of Great Hearts Academies, a group of AZ charter schools. In a 1992 article about Heiler being hired to help Gov. Fife Symington shape policies, the Phoenix New Times wrote, "In the early Eighties, Heiler was one in a series of students who took over the [ASU] paper and used its editorial pages to push their conservative bent-attacking liberal professors, homosexuals and others." In a 2003 issue of the AZ Republic, he listed his favorite columnists as Peggy Noonan and Christopher Hitchens, and said "Forget it" when asked if he had any favorite columnists in the political center.

Other members are Raena James, Principal of La Paloma Academy, and Eileen Sigmund, co-founder of BASIS Schools. The other two people are Susan Chan and Rick Ogston, who I don't know.

The association clearly has a conservative bent. That's important to know, since the types of changes it pushes for will likely be those that appeal to conservatives.