SR1 College Preparatory and STEM Academy seemed poised to close four months ago. At a hearing in May, an attorney for the Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board had built a case detailing severe fiscal mismanagement by school executives.
Discussions at several previous board meetings had also exposed serious problems, such as overprojecting enrollment and other questionable business practices. The issues could cost the school its charter.
But the board couldn’t just act on that information. First, it needs a recommendation from the hearing officer. The officer has not acted, and the school remains open.
Under the leadership of a new provost, SR1 CPSA students attend classes in what was once a daycare facility in Canton. Tamu Green, the school’s founder and chief executive officer, said he plans to enroll 200 students by next school year. He reported 98 students at the end of the last school year.
Hearing officer Kim Turner asks questions during a hearing about SR1 on Thursday, May 14, 2026, in Jackson. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi TodayLisa Karmacharya, the charter board’s executive director, said Thursday she had anticipated making a decision in time for the current school year if the recommendation was to revoke the school’s charter so parents could find another option that fits their children’s needs.
At the May 14 hearing, hearing officer Kim Turner asked Dillon Pitts, an attorney who represents the charter board, and Jamie Travis, an attorney who represents SR1 CPSA, to submit additional findings of fact and conclusion of law within 30 days of completing the transcript. Then Turner would begin work on her recommendation to the charter board. She said the bulk of the work would be analyzing hundreds of documents submitted by the attorneys.
“I will, within a reasonable time, provide a written report and recommendations to the board,” Turner said at the hearing. She later said the parties “could be several months out” from the board voting on her recommendation.
Turner is also director of the state agencies division at the attorney general’s office. The attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to a request from Mississippi Today for a status update on the transcript or on Turner’s work toward making a recommendation.
At the hearing, Travis suggested he might appeal the recommendation, which could delay the process further. Turner said she would include an appeal deadline within her recommendation.
Mississippi Today asked Karmacharya if the board received evidence of whether the mismanagement that put the school’s charter at risk is still happening. She said she can’t comment because of the charter board’s active investigation into the school.
Depending on the vote, SR1 CPSA would be the first school in the state to have its charter revoked by the authorizer board.
Dillon Pitts, attorney for the Mississippi Charter School Authorizer Board, right, questions Letitia Johnson, the board’s finance director, during a hearing about SR1 on Thursday, May 14, 2026, in Jackson. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi TodayManagement concerns abounded at the school, Pitts said during the hearing. He described conditions that could affect students’ safety, such as subpar health standards and a lack of documented support for students with disabilities.
The Canton charter school was out of compliance with federal guidelines that ensure healthy and safe food for students, according to Pitts, who referred to a 2026 inspection of the school cafeteria. Pitts presented evidence that seven out of 11 individualized learning plans, or IEPs, were also missing signatures from parents or guardians. These plans ensure school officials accommodate a student’s disability.
Read more: Mississippi may shut down a Canton charter school for severe fiscal mismanagement
Pitts claimed school officials didn’t disclose the use of credit cards to pay for school supplies they bought from Amazon. Backup documentation such as receipts and invoices were not always provided, he said.
The charter board began the process of revoking the school’s charter in December after determining the school had one day’s cash on hand, or $24,000. The charter board had also discussed revoking its charter in December 2023 because school leaders requested money to serve 150 students but enrolled 12. The school overestimated its enrollment each subsequent year.
Tamu Green, CEO of SR1, confers with Dorlisa Hutton, chief operations officer and vice president for SR1 College Preparatory and STEM Academy, during a hearing on Thursday, May 14, 2026, in Jackson. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi TodayTravis argued the school never missed payments and had a bank account balance that exceeded the required reserve amount mandated by the authorizer board. Green also claimed that charter authorizer board staff offered little technical support to the school business manager.
Green made the same claim in May at a town hall meeting he hosted in Canton for parents, staff and community members. He asked parents to advocate for the school ahead of the critical vote to revoke its charter.
Renee Truss, whose grandson is a first grader at SR1 CPSA, attended the charter board’s June meeting and asked the group to keep the school open. She said it offered her grandson the kind of attention he would not get in nearby public schools.
“Understand that there are students that are affected,” she said. “As a parent, we don’t know about the finances and the monies that the school has. But we’ve been recently made aware of the financial challenges of the school. And being made aware of those challenges, we have rallied behind SR1 in our community because we know the difference that it has made.
“At SR1 it appears that the students’ needs are being met.”
On Thursday, Truss told Mississippi Today she still feels the same way. She said she believes the school can endure with community support.
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