The Minnesota Court of Appeals has upheld a penalty of nearly $140,000 that state Education Commissioner Alice Seagren imposed against a metro-area charter school for employing teachers who lacked proper licenses.
In an unpublished opinion released Tuesday, Judge Michelle Larkin wrote that Seagren did not abuse her discretion when she moved to withhold state aid from Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy (TiZA).
In November, Seagren ruled that eight teachers at TiZA did not have appropriate licenses when Minnesota Department of Education officials investigated complaints of licensure violations at the school in the spring of 2009.
After an unannounced site inspection in March 2009, department officials initially reported that 23 teachers -- roughly two-thirds of TiZA’s teaching staff -- were out of compliance with state licensure requirements.
The K-8 charter school has campuses in Inver Grove Heights and Blaine.
