Highlands charter schools avoid closure after county board overturns revocation
The hearing room broke into emotional cheers Tuesday evening when the Sacramento County Board of Education voted to overturn Twin Rivers Unified School District’s decision to revoke the charter for Highlands Community Charter and Technical Schools, preventing the schools from being forcibly closed.
Supporters of Highlands hugged each other, walking out of the room chanting “Highlands” in excitement. “Never give up,” one supporter shouted. Anibal Meza, a former student of Highlands who spoke before the board, said that he was glad that “more people will have the opportunity to grow and change their lives with Highlands” as he did.
Jonathan Raymond, the executive director of Highlands who joined the schools in July after the dispute surfaced, also shared hugs with staff and supporters of the schools.
Raymond said the decision represents a validation for Highlands students that “they matter.”
“They were seen and they were heard tonight,” Raymond said. “We’ll be back in school tomorrow with our classes.”
The development effectively reverses Twin Rivers’ January action and keeps the schools open for now in a dispute that followed state audit findings that Highlands received about $180 million in public funding it was not eligible for during the 2022 through 2024 fiscal years.
Highlands is a nonprofit that provides both the traditional classroom instruction through Highlands Community Charter School and a high school education program serving immigrants, refugees and formerly incarcerated people through the California Innovative Career Academy.
Following an investigation by ABC10, the state auditor found in June that in addition to receiving the $180 million for which it was ineligible, Highlands engaged in wasteful spending and inappropriate hiring practices, hired unqualified teachers and had poor student outcomes likely due to its large class sizes.
The audit also faulted oversight by TRUSD and the Sacramento County Office of Education.
Some of the spending included roughly $2 million worth of employee trips to San Diego, $80,000 to Maui, and $2,600 to France.
The findings led to TRUSD’s decision to revoke the school’s charter in January.
A fight over the cure deadline
On Tuesday, more than 200 people attended the hearing, where Highlands supporters held signs that read “stand with immigrants” and encouraged one another as they shared positive experiences with the schools, while opponents argued revocation is necessary to hold the schools accountable.
At the center of heated discussion that split the trustees in 4-3 votes for both schools was whether Twin Rivers had substantial evidence to revoke the charters after Highlands failed to cure violations by the Sept. 26 deadline, or whether the district’s later actions gave the schools more time to address those violations.
Highlands argued Twin Rivers gave the schools additional time to cure the violations after the Sept. 26 deadline by continuing to work with them and allowing them to submit more evidence, documentation and plans showing compliance with the Notice of Violations by Jan. 2.
Harold Fong, a board trustee, said while he supports Highlands students who want to learn English and receive the opportunity to become part of American society, he cannot overlook the violations made by Highlands’ previous management.
“Even though the management has changed, the corporation violated a lot of things, and there were omissions to those violations,” Fong said.
“I have to go with what is in the law and what was done by the corporation, regardless of past management and the current management.”
Trustees Vanessa Caigoy and Alfred Brown focused on Twin Rivers staff’s recommendation in January that the schools had addressed the violations and should not have their charters revoked.
TRUSD may appeal to the State Board of Education, though it would be an unusual case for a district to appeal a county board’s reversal.
Celebrating a second chance
Anna Mozghova was among those who briefly stood outside the hearing room after the vote, as supporters celebrated Highlands’ victory. In excitement, Mozghova said she arrived in the U.S. in 2019 from Ukraine and started attending Highlands from 2020 through 2022, where now she works as a teacher.
“(Highlands) showed me how Americanism works,” Mozghova said.
“I will tell my students that we’re going to stay, we’re going to celebrate and we will discuss their graduation day.”
This story was originally published May 20, 2026 at 7:00 AM with the headline "Highlands charter schools avoid closure after county board overturns revocation."
