- (954) 815-9568
- (954) 732-3122
- jmatthews@educaresolutions.us
- Charlotte and Sarasota offices
Alliance Education Services (AES) provides a wide range of services to build and support successful charter school programs by integrating over 40 years of combined experience in the charter school sector.
Our compelling belief: A successful charter school is anchored in strong leadership, financial efficacy, instructional pedagogy, and positive community relations that results in superior educational outcomes for its students. AES can support charter schools in each unique phase of operations including:
Alliance Education Services is a 501c3 conferred Non Profit Charter Support Organization (CSO). AES is purposefully designed to operate with all of the advantages of a large Education Service Provider or Charter Management Organization (ESP/EMO/CMO), with none of its potential drawbacks and instead adds all of the advantages of a 501c3 Not-for Profit.
Our experience and expertise as site-based leaders who are also operators and developers allow us to contribute value nationally in any charter school environment by providing the exact amount of support needed to ensure the school’s long term success by:
Mr. Justin Matthews has served as a public school educator in the states of Florida and North Carolina for the past twenty-two years. He has held the positions of CEO/Executive Director, Region Director, Founding K-12 Principal, Chief of Operations, Principal, and Assistant Principal, while also serving as an elementary and high school teacher in his career. Over the course of his career Mr. Matthews has been directly responsible for the successful construction of over two million square feet of charter school facilities, numerous gymnasiums, sports fields, cafeterias, playgrounds and other similar developments valued at over three hundred million dollars in financing for charter schools, most recently a record setting twenty-four million dollar building and multiple sport field project at Mountain Island Charter School and one of the first stand-alone new charter school bond financings in history with a twenty-four million dollar bond issuance for Southwest Charlotte STEM Academy. In addition to currently leading one of the largest and most successful K-12 charter schools and state organizations in North Carolina, Mr. Matthews regularly works nationally with multiple schools and state entities through his 501c3 Non-Profit consulting firm Alliance Education Services, and with Cognia/AdvancED as a Lead External Review Evaluator. He was the 2010 National Innovation Principal of the year. Schools under his leadership have won numerous national awards in the areas of academics, parent choice, school culture, and operations.
Onsite School Experience | [2013-Present] Mountain Island Charter School, Mt. Holly, NC Executive Director § Directly Responsible for all operations of the Mountain Island Charter School K-12 program. § Master Trainer for NC Budget and all RTO offerings in conjunction with OCS/DPI and the NC Association for Public Charter Schools [2005-2013] Imagine Schools, multiple counties in FL, GA, TX and OH Founding Principal and Region Director § Responsible for the creation, development and operation of largest and most successful charter school in Sarasota County, FL with over 1125 Preschool- 12th grade students and 120 staff members on three distinct campuses. § Responsible for the daily operations of the North Port K-12, Palmer Ranch K-8, Lakewood Ranch K-8 and other programs across the state as needed. § Accountable to Governing Boards for all school operations: including but not limited to curriculum, finance, management, facility, and personnel. § Accountable to sponsoring school district related to all provisions and requirements inherent in the schools’ charter agreements in addition to applicable state and local laws and processes related to charter school management and operation. § Collaborated with team to develop and implement unique school vision, mission, positive school culture, and instructional scope and sequence. § Improved curriculum planning, instructional pedagogy, student learning outcomes and school grade from an initial C grade to three consecutive A grades over the history of theschools. § Designed and expanded campuses to increase program offerings and |
Trainings
Education | § Earned numerous school awards, media recognition and positive reputation for charter schools in SarasotaCounty. § Co-Chairman, 2010 National Forum and Conference. Attended by over 2000 educators with 200 distinct PD offerings across 4 days. Total budget including convention and hotel space, 12 meals and 7 snack presentations: $2.8MM. § Member of the school district’s Charter Review Committee § Founding member of the CHILD National Leadership Advisory Council § Served as Regional and National support to other schools and school leaders for instructional leadership, principal mentoring, and school program development. Imagine School at Weston Weston, FL Principal § Responsible for daily operation of school with 1050 K-5 students and direct supervision of 86 staff members together with hiring and evaluation of personnel, horizontal and vertical curriculum design, implementation and assessment. § Created and implemented master school schedules including core curriculum areas, specials, recess, and arrival/dismissalschedules. § Created and implemented school discipline plan with character education curriculum and a positive reinforcementprogram. § Co-founded Spanish Bi-literate Immersion Program for Students [1998-2005] Alachua County School Board, Gainesville, FL Teacher, Assistant Principal and Safety Coordinator § Responsible for cross curricular instruction of over 700 students. § Directly responsible for student safety as well as local traffic safety and procedures for arrival/dismissal, overnight field trips,etc. § Member of School Advisory Council, Curriculum Council, Building Committee, Textbook Adoption Committee Advanc-ED/SACS CASI Quality Assurance External Review Chairperson Security training including building, perimeter, off-site security, traffic safety, logistics, crisis response and planning. Advanced computer training with Microsoft-based software, hardware, Cisco network installation and management, VOIP technology, educational software, Promethean and SMART Board technology. Academic/Other Trainings include: NCCSS, MTSS/RTI, Kagan, CRISS, PBASS, FBA/PBIP, EOG/EOC, Gradual Release, Common Core Integration, EC/ESE, ELL Coordinator, Threat Assessment, TERMS, Transportation, Powerschool, ISIS.
[2002-2004] University of Florida Gainesville, FL Master’s inEducational Leadership § Florida Professional Certification in K-12 EducationalLeadership § Doctoral Fellowship Conferred
[1993-1998] University of Florida Gainesville, FL Bachelor’s in Education § Summa Cum Laude § Multiple Full Scholarship Recipient |
Charter School Development/Financing
Bert Newsome, Managing Director Education Finance Group
BB&T Capital Markets
200 South College Street, Suite 750
Charlotte, NC 28202
T: 704-954-1418
C: 336-254-3146
Rhonda Dillingham, Executive Director NC Association for Public Charter Schools
P.O. Box 4877 Asheboro, NC 27204 (336) 669-9996
Jennifer Lucas, Chief Academic Officer Alliance Education Services, Inc. jlucas@educaresolutions.us
p (954)732-3122
f (888) 799-3166
Seth Klempner, Director Rosemawr Management LLC 810 Seventh Avenue 27th Floor New York, NY 10019
Main: (212) 286-9474
Direct: (212) 400-7392
sklempner@rosemawr.com Charter Construction Support
Shekeria Barnes, Founding Principal Southwest Charlotte STEM Academy 5203 Shopton Road, Charlotte, NC 28278
(980) 505-8344
Paul Lemley, Executive Vice President BC Construction Group
M: 616-2950755 | paul@bccgp.com | www.bccgp.com
Headquartes | 10153 Grand River | Brighton, MI 48116 | P: 810-225-2001
Raleigh Ofice | 400 W. North Street, Suite 112 | Raleigh, NC 27603 | P: 919-827-4140
Deanna Smith, Principal Mallard Creek STEM Academy
9142 Browne Rd, Charlotte, NC 28269 dsmith@mcstemacademy.org
(631) 707-6449
Additional references available on request
Jennifer serves as the Chief Academic Officer and works nationally with multiple schools and state entities through her 501c3 Non-Profit consulting firm Alliance Education Services, Inc. to provide initial and ongoing support for charter schools including all phases of startup, educational design and implementation, organizational and operational support, compliance and academic improvement.
Jennifer can provide short and long-term management and consulting solutions for charter schools, financial institutions and development firms. Jennifer has served the charter school industry as a Teacher, Instructional Coach, Principal and Superintendent for K-12 schools since 2005.
In addition to serving her schools and clients, Jennifer is the Co-Chair of the North Carolina Association for Public Charter Schools and provides a wide array of support for governing boards and school leaders through state, regional, and local conferences and workshops. Jennifer also serves as an external evaluator for Cognia (formerly Advanc-ED) in Florida and North Carolina to help all schools (public, charter, private) in their efforts towards continuous improvement for student outcomes.
[Chief Academic Officer] — [Alliance Education Services, Inc.] | [2013] — [current] |
Initial and ongoing support for charter schools in North Carolina, Florida, South Carolina, and Indiana. | |
[Managing Director] — [Voyager Academy] | [2014] — [2020] |
Responsible for all Superintendent duties for a K-12 charter school serving 1350 students in 4 buildings on 11+acres with a 14+ mm annual budget · Earned Investment Grade Rating through Moody’s Investments · Earned Initial Rating through Standard and Poor · Secured 3 separate public bond offerings and commercial financing from 2014-2019 · Earned Full Accreditation · Earned 10-year charter renewal · Recognized as one of the highest performing charter schools in NC | |
Leadership
Charter school training and support services in all areas of academics and achievement, Special Education, MTSS, Curriculum and support in all areas of daily fiscal management, third-party vendor contracts and negotiations and yearly budgeting to meet the goals of the school program. Work directly with school leadership and governing boards to provide training and support for the day-to- day operations in the school and the long term continuous improvement model.
References
Rhonda Dillingham, Executive Director NC Association for Public Charter Schools
P.O. Box 4877 Asheboro, NC 27204 (336) 669-9996 rhonda@ncpubliccharters.org
Lisa Gordon Stella, Attorney at Law Lisa Gordon Stella, PLLC
4325 Swarthmore Rd, Durham, NC 2770
919-274-5719
Maggie Mirsky, Vice President
D.A. Davidson Companies Denver, CO
p: 303.764.5721 | p: 469.314.3169 | c: 303.229.8878
mmirsky@dadco.com www.davidsoncompanies.com/ficm
Bert Newsome, Managing Director Education Finance Group BB&T Capital Markets
200 South College Street, Suite 750
Charlotte, NC 28202
T: 704-954-1418
C: 336-254-3146
Deanna Smith, Principal Mallard Creek STEM Academy
9142 Browne Rd, Charlotte, NC 28269 dsmith@mcstemacademy.org
Alliance Education Services has successfully facilitated over $300 million dollars in charter school financing for their clients over the past 20 years, specializing in:
Extending credit for school clients
We have broad experience working with multiple lending sources, including:
Additionally, AES is contracted on a regular basis by financial institutions to support all sides of a charter school transaction. Below are some of our most recent engagements:
For more information on how we can best help with a charter school transaction, please contact us HERE.
