The Jackson Public Schools board voted unanimously to deny a charter school’s request to expand into high school grades — but that isn’t stopping Ambition Prep’s plans, its leader said. 

The Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board approved Ambition Preparatory Charter School’s request to expand into grades nine through 12 at its July meeting. The school currently serves kindergarten through eighth-grade students. However, leaders of the local public school district voiced their disapproval at their board meeting Tuesday night.

“The establishment of this high school will have significant long-term implications, including decreased enrollment in existing high schools, particularly smaller ones, resulting in an impact on district fiscal operations,” JPS Superintendent Errick Greene said. He also noted that a new high school would likely affect teacher recruitment at the public school district. 

Greene made clear in an impassioned speech that the district views Ambition’s foray into higher grades as the establishment of a new school, not an expansion.

It’s an important distinction.

According to state law, charter schools can only be established in areas where the local school district is rated A, B or C if the local school district’s board approves. There’s no appeal process, so if the school board denies the request, the process ends. New charter schools can only be established without local school board approval in areas rated D or F. 

But expanding an existing charter school to serve more grades is relatively new territory. The Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board, which is tasked with approving new or expanded charter schools, established a new policy in 2023 that addresses charter schools that want to expand.

Lisa Karmacharya, executive director of the authorizer board, says that, in this instance, Ambition Prep is not starting a new school, so it doesn’t have to follow the state law for establishing new charter schools.

The JPS vote came as a shock to Karmacharya when reached by Mississippi Today. 

“I am absolutely speechless,” she said. “My mouth dropped open.”

Karmacharya said that DeArchie Scott, Ambition’s executive director, completed a “healthy and robust application for the expansion” under the new policy and should continue with the process. 

That’s exactly what Scott plans to do, he said. 

“It’s not a new application, so it goes based on what the (local public school) district was rated at the time of approval, which was an ‘F,’” he said. “It’s already been approved by our authorizer board, so we don’t need approval from JPS.”

Ambition Prep, which opened in 2019, got a C in the latest Mississippi school report card, as did Jackson Public Schools. 

Clarksdale Collegiate Public Charter School in the Delta was previously approved as the state’s first charter high school, but that was through a merger. Ambition is the first school in the state to take advantage of the charter board’s new expansion policy to start serving higher grades. If the charter’s buildout is completed in fall 2027, it would make Ambition Prep the second charter high school in the state and the only charter high school in Jackson.

It’s not clear how the dispute will be resolved, or if it will escalate to litigation.

A spokesperson for Jackson Public Schools said the district’s board of trustees would “pursue all available options at its disposal to support its position regarding Ambition Prep’s request.”