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Maricopa parents frustrated after school meeting

Posted at 5:15 AM, Oct 02, 2015
and last updated 2015-10-02 08:15:49-04

After a tumultuous week at Sequoia Pathway Academy, a charter school in Maricopa, parents came to a meeting at the school Thursday night expecting answers.

Many left disappointed.

"It was a big waste of time," Carson Daniel, whose son is a sophomore at the school, said after meeting.

Daniel said his son told him that only half of the school's students are showing up for class after Tuesday's apparent ouster of interim Principal Nate Lamma and interim Vice Principal Diane Silvia. 

Carrie Ulrich, who has two children at Sequoia, came to the meeting wanting to know why Lamma and Silvia were apparently removed from their positions.

"It's cowardice," she said of the lack of the explanation provided.

An assistant superintendent told a full house inside the school's gym Thursday night that she would not discuss the controversy because it involves personnel issues, which are shielded by privacy laws. A reporter reviewing state and federal statutes could find no such privacy law Thursday night.

The school is operated by EdKey, Inc., a non-profit based in Mesa. But some of the same people who lead EdKey, Inc., Patric Greer and Douglas Pike, also oversee EdKey Management, a for-profit company based at the same Mesa office.

The relationship between the two entities was not immediately available Thursday night.