The Board of Education voted on April 26 to approve the first charter school in Charles County.
The Phoenix International School of the Arts (PISOTA) will open in the 2022-2023 school year as a middle school serving Grades 6-7 and expand the following year to include Grades 6-8. Located in Waldorf, the school will count as the school system’s ninth middle school.
PISOTA will have an arts-focused program of study using the Cambridge International Education curriculum that meets Maryland State Department of Education and Charles County Public Schools (CCPS) course and assessment requirements.
CCPS Superintendent Kimberly Hill recommended that the Board grant the charter to PISOTA. The school will allow any middle school student enrolled in Charles County Public Schools to apply to attend. The application process is not yet final.
Once it begins operations, PISOTA would be another public school within CCPS. The school is subject to all expectations set out in the charter but overseen by a board of directors and an executive director. The executive director, Angelica Jackson, presented the vision for the school at the Board’s April 26 work session.
The co-founders of PISOTA submitted their public charter school application to the Charles County Board of Education in December. The Board and the school’s administration will now formalize the approval in a charter agreement. The charter will set out the legal requirements, expectations, conditions and deadlines for the school’s operation.
For more information, visit the PISOTA website: www.pisota.org.
