GMCS, learning company exchange complaints
By Molly Ann Howell
Managing Editor
A Virginia-based education company that Gallup-McKinley County Schools partnered with to provide online schooling to its students has filed an ethics complaint against Superintendent Mike Hyatt, claiming that he retaliated against the company and tried to terminate its contract with the school district after it turned him down for a “lucrative job.”
In an interview with the Sun, Hyatt admitted that he did apply for Stride Inc.’s VP of Academic Innovation in December.
“I wasn’t in the market for a new job, but I noticed a position that came up in this company that [I thought was interesting] having to do with A.I. integration in their educational platform,” Hyatt said. “One weekend I put my name in for the position and that was the start of it. I wasn’t necessarily looking to leave … obviously my contract goes for a couple of years, and I just renewed my contract. But I just threw my name into the bucket for them to look at.”
The ethics complaint that was filed April 28 states that Hyatt’s applying for the job violates the Government Conduct Act and the New Mexico Procurement Code. The GCA has specific prohibitions against a public officer or employee seeking employment with a company who has a contract with a governmental entity. A public school such as GMCS is a governmental entity.
“The GCA requires that public employees treat their government position as a public trust,” the complaint states, adding the Procurement Code “prohibits contemporaneous employment with a contractor.”
“Mr. Hyatt has ostensibly tried to leverage his position as Superintendent to secure a lucrative job with the Contractor, a company over which he has regulatory authority,” the complaint states. “Superintendent Hyatt has evidently put his own interest above [about] 4,200 students’ and their families’ interests by seeking employment contrary to the GCA and the Procurement Code.”
The job application asked whether Hyatt was “subject to any type of agreement with a current or former employer or entity that would restrict” his ability to work for Stride.
“Superintendent Hyatt’s response was ‘No’ even though he should have known that he was subject to the GCA’s and Procurement Code’s prohibition from seeking employment with a contractor to the District,” the complaint states.
The complaint also alleges Hyatt “appeared to log onto the virtual interview from his District computer using his District e-mail address during the school day … in likely violation of the GCA’s requirement that a public employee use the resources of public office only to advance the public interest and not to pursue private interests.”
Ultimately, Hyatt didn’t get the job. He was interviewed in early February, but by Feb. 21 he received a phone call from Stride’s senior vice president of schools Adam Hawf letting him know that the company was cutting many positions within their organization, including the one he applied for.
Knowing what he knows now, Hyatt said not getting the job was a blessing.
“I don’t care whether I get a job or not,” Hyatt said. “[My applying] was kind of on a whim. If I were to think about doing something different, that looked like an interesting position. But I’m very grateful they eliminated the position, because I would’ve probably been stuck in a toxic situation.”
GMCS ALLEGEDLY CATCHES STRIDE, INC. BREAKING THE LAW
Hyatt’s opinion about the company he tried to join changed drastically after he learned they were allegedly breaking the law.
GMCS’s data analyst was reviewing school data in late January before sending it off to the Public Education Department when he noticed something odd. He reportedly found that Stride, Inc., in about 80 different situations, was breaking the law when it comes to student/teacher ratio.
According to New Mexico Statutes Chapter 22, there can only be 20 students for every teacher in a kindergarten class. For elementary school from first to third grade, there can be 22 students for every teacher. Then for grades four, fifth, or six, the limit is 24 students for every teacher.
When it comes to middle school and high school teachers, who see a larger amount of students since they teach one subject every day and the students travel between classrooms, they are allowed to teach a maximum of 135 students each day, with a cap of 27 students per class. English teachers have a limit of seeing 150 students per day.
Hyatt acknowledged that overages can occur, but not at the level GMCS was seeing with Stride.
“Now it can happen in any district where you get an influx in students or it’s difficult to hire somebody, you can’t find somebody, and at times you’re gonna have some overages,” he said. “But this was pretty extensive; we’d never seen anything like this for this particular population.”
Once the data analyst realized that Stride was potentially breaking the law, he alerted the company to the problem.
Hyatt said a Stride representative apologized for their mistake, and said they would hire more teachers to alleviate the situation.
The data analyst and GMCS Deputy Superintendent Jvanna Hanks III met with Stride Feb. 3. During that meeting, Stride representatives once again acknowledged their mistake and asked the school district to hold them accountable.
Things escalated March 5 when Hyatt stumbled upon an article from the Lexington Herald Leader, a Kentucky newspaper. The article states that Stride “agreed to a settlement in 2016 over accusations it made false claims about its business.”
The article triggered Hyatt’s memory.
“When I read that article, I remembered a conversation I had with Stride a month or so earlier, not having to do with my job application,” he said. “They had mentioned to me that they were trying to do some different scheduling to see if instead of hiring more teachers could they do kind of ‘creative scheduling’ to put more students per teacher. And I told them ‘the law is the law, you guys need to hire more teachers.’”
Hyatt believes that the company was trying to “squeeze” the district for more money rather than hire more staff. He said it all has to do with Stride trying to increase their stock value.
Stride’s stock market skyrocketed, reaching $147.79 million in late March.
Hyatt is accusing the company of caring more about turning a profit than the students they serve.
GMCS and Stride started their partnership in 2020. Back then, Stride was serving about 1,500 students across New Mexico. Now, they serve about 4,000. Hyatt said Stride is paid about $8,000-$10,000 per student they work with.
Stride offers a fully virtual option for students for whom a traditional classroom doesn’t work.
Besides creating a potentially stressful workload for its teacher and an unsupportive learning environment for kids, Hyatt said what Stride is doing is breaking the law.
GMCS sent a termination for cause letter to Stride April 1. The letter, which was included in the ethics complaint, outlines alleged violations of “applicable law and local policy,” including exceeding the required teacher-student ratio and not having appropriately licensed teachers.
Stride’s lawyers did not respond to a request for comment from the Sun, but they were quoted in an April 28 Santa Fe New Mexican article. In a statement issued by its attorney, Laura Sanchez of Rodey, Dickason, Sloan, Akin & Robb P.A., Stride said it stood firmly by its performance.
“We are successfully helping thousands of students, many of whom are engaged in credit recovery, to catch up and make meaningful academic progress,” the company said. “We are proud of the achievements of our students. Families continue to choose this program because of the positive impact it has on their children’s education.”
The ethics complaints states that Hyatt knew about the alleged student-teacher ratios and the licensure issues prior to submitting his application for employment with Stride.
Hyatt says the company is using the fact of his application as a “scapegoat’ to hide behind.
“This is a billion dollar company that is worried about the public perception of their data from their product and they’re trying to use me as a scapegoat to deflect and create a different narrative than what took place with their poor performance,” he said.
STRIDE CONTINUES TO ACCUSE HYATT
Stride has until May 15 to fix the issues GMCS found with their contract.
The school district has already started looking at other companies to potentially work with if the agreement with Stride goes south. Hyatt said they’ve put out RFPs in the interest of finding a different company for next school year.
The ethics complaint also accuses Hyatt of shopping around for other virtual learning companies and trying to get a job with one of them.
Hyatt responded to that claim by saying he hasn’t applied for any other jobs since 2014, and he has no say when it comes to the district’s procurement department.
“Per the law, I can’t just get a contractor for this type of contract,” Hyatt said. “I also can’t cancel a contract. The school board will decide after May 15 whether or not they cured the contract and whether or not they want to continue working with them.”
