Charter School Wants to Occupy Fogelsville Campus

After being , a planned charter school is looking to move into the former Penn State University-Lehigh Valley campus in Fogelsville.

The Circle of Seasons Charter School is seeking to open at 8380 Mohr Lane, which has a Fogelsville address but is actually in Northwestern Lehigh School District.

Circle of Seasons would be a Waldorf-methods public school and it would have to gain approval from the Northwestern Lehigh School Board to set up within the district. School organizer Phil Arnold sent an e-mail to supporters saying he sent Northwestern Lehigh an updated application and he expects the district to hold a public hearing on the issue in June. He asked those in favor of the school’s creation to show up.

In February, Parkland School Board denied the Circle of Seasons application to open in the  Manito Equestrian Center in South Whitehall, saying the charter school would not meet state standards.

Among other things, the Parkland Board objected to the fact that the charter proposal contained no actual design for a school building and felt there weren’t proper provisions made for special education students or those with English as a second language.

Phil Arnold is one of the founders of the  in Emmaus, where he held the post of co-administrator. The Seven Generations board dismissed Arnold and his co-administrator in August 2010 for reasons they declined to specify, according to The Morning Call. A trustee said only that the board planned to go in a different direction.

At the time, Arnold said such “growing pains” were not uncommon at charter schools and he trusted that the board would take the school in a positive direction.