In a

meeting that lasted just over two minutes Monday morning,

the Coweta County Board of Education rejected the fourth

proposal for a charter school by the Odyssey Group.

The

dismissal of the petition angered Odyssey School

organizers, who thought they had supplied the school

system all of the information to pass the petition.

"It's

unfortunate that the Coweta County school board continues

to persist in taking actions which reflect so negatively

on the school system where there are so many excellent

people working in education in the county and there are

many good things going on here," said Odyssey

organizer Jan Buchwald.

Buchwald

said the school board at its Aug. 10 meeting instructed

Odyssey officials to meet with the school system's staff

to address concerns.

Odyssey

organizers met with the school representatives and

expected the board to approve the petition since it had

addressed the concerns of school officials.

Since the

board did not approve the petition, a fifth petition by

Odyssey organizers would fall under the school system's

new charter school policy.

The new

policy is far more restrictive than the Georgia Charter

Schools Act, Buchwald said.

"Our

school board's actions clearly continue to keep the

spotlight on the need for legislative changes. Without

improved legislation, parent-organized charter schools in

Georgia are going to be extremely rare," she said.

Superintendent

of education Richard Brooks said the board turned down

the petition because Odyssey School officials had

submitted another petition Sept. 30 and the board had to

deal with the fourth petition before it could consider

the one submitted last week.

Brooks said

the board would have to decide on the latest petition by

Nov. 30 and said it would fall under the system's new

policy, which calls for a site to be identified.

The Odyssey

charter school efforts started in April when the first

petition was proposed to the school board.