While pointing to mismanagement as the cause of mass layoffs and program cuts at Epic Charter School, state officials agreed Monday to hire an accounting firm to investigate further and recommend corrective action.
The Statewide Charter School Board voted unanimously to authorize its staff to hire auditors to look into financial and operational decisions that led to Epic’s recent crisis, a decision the school’s leaders say they support. The statewide board’s staff has been looking into finances at Epic, Oklahoma’s biggest virtual charter school and third-largest school district, since May and so far has found no evidence of fraud.
However, members of the board questioned why Epic administrators didn’t cut expenses sooner while the school’s main revenue source, student enrollment, dramatically decreased over the past four years.
The board’s financial compliance officer and on-staff CPA, Skyler Lusnia, said Epic administrators had overestimated revenue and underestimated expenses, putting the school at risk of insolvency.
“I think ‘mismanagement’ is probably a really good word to have said,” Lusnia told the board. “Because while, again, we have not isolated or identified any fraud, if you look at the projections for revenue and expenditures versus actuals, it was just clear and obvious that it should have been pointed out sooner.”
The ensuing budget shortfall resulted in two rounds of mass layoffs during the 2024-25 school year that cut a total of 501 employees. Epic replaced its superintendent, Bart Banfield, and deputy superintendent of finance, Jeanise Wynn, amid the fallout.
“Epic Charter Schools supports the Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board action today calling for an outside accounting firm to review the finances and organizational processes of Oklahoma’s largest virtual public charter school,” interim Superintendent Justin Hunt said in a statement. “Epic has been and remains committed to working closely with SCSB to ensure safeguards are in place to secure the long-term financial stability of the organization, so we can continue to provide the best possible educational experience and outcomes for the approximately 30,000 students and families we serve statewide.”
Staff and program cuts helped Epic finish the 2025 fiscal year out of the red, but the school will have to rely on a $30 million line of credit to cover necessary expenses over the next few months, Lusnia said.
Epic enrolled about 30,000 students in the 2024-25 school year, about half as many as in 2020-21. Enrollment skyrocketed to 60,000 students in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic as families flocked to online learning, but it has steadily declined ever since.
In his first meeting since being re-appointed to the statewide board, William Pearson questioned why school leaders didn’t respond to the decreasing enrollment with corresponding cuts to staffing and expenses.
Pearson, who is the Senate president pro tem’s choice to replace departing board member Becky Gooch, served on the board in 2023 and 2024 when it focused solely on virtual charter schools like Epic.
“If you see your revenue stream is drying up, then you’ve got to make the necessary adjustments,” Pearson said during the meeting.
Board chairperson Brian Shellem said the audit will investigate what information which school administrators knew and when. It also should address how informed and involved Epic’s governing board was during that timeline.
At this point, he said, it seems “crystal clear” there was negligence.
“Timing is a critical point for many things in life, right?” Shellem said during the meeting. “If you’re driving down the road and it curves, if you wait 10 seconds maybe you miss the curve.”
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