Tuition-Free Public Charter School Coming to Baldwin Township?

The Baldwin-Whitehall area may be welcoming a new public charter school soon, as the Baldwin Township Planning Commission will review an application on Monday from Newport Drive Properties seeking "Conditional Use Approval" to operate a public school at 600 Newport Drive (the former Rolling Hills Manor property).

The planning commission meeting, which is a public gathering, will be held in the on Community Park Drive on Monday at 6 p.m.

Baldwin Township's Board of Commissioners will then hold another public meeting at the municipal building that same night at 7 to review the planning commission's meeting and to hear public comments on the topic of the potential public school.

While Baldwin Township's official notice of this coming Monday's meetings does not reveal the identity of the public school, a "Young Scholars of Western Pennsylvania Charter School" is claiming on its website that it indeed will be located at 600 Newport Drive in Baldwin Township.

That website is also listing open house sessions. However, those sessions will not be held on Newport Drive, according to that website. Instead, they will be held at 4143 Brownsville Road, Suite No. 6, in Brentwood Borough.

That website also claims that the Young Scholars of Western Pennsylvania Charter School is a "sister school" of the "Young Scholars of Central Pennsylvania Charter School."

The Young Scholars of Central Pennsylvania Charter School has seen its share of controversy, according to this article published in the Centre Daily Times on March 22.

That article reads:

"The Young Scholars of Central Pennsylvania Charter School in Ferguson Township is one of more than 100 charter schools across the country that are the (sic) part of a federal investigation, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Sunday(, March 20).

"A spokeswoman from the U.S. Attorney's Office would not confirm the report Monday, (March 21,) saying the office does not comment on anything that is or may be under investigation.

"The newspaper cited unidentified knowledgeable sources to say that 'federal agencies — including the FBI and the departments of Labor and Education — are investigating whether some charter school employees are kicking back part of their salaries to a Muslim movement founded by (Fethullah) Gulen,' a major Islamic political figure in Turkey.

"Attorneys for Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the Poconos, argued that he had 'overseen the establishment of a conglomeration of schools throughout the world' when he successfully argued to be granted a green card in the United States."

Gulen's website can be seen here.