# New Heights School *Minnesota charter school, Stillwater.* New Heights School is a charter school in [[Stillwater]], [[Minnesota]]. The project's at-issue record identifies it as the nation's oldest K–12 charter school and reports that it opened in 1993 and enrolls 111 students. The record does not give the date of that enrollment count.[^1] The school operates under Minnesota's charter-school law, Minn. Stat. ch. 124E. That chapter codifies the 1991 charter statute, which the project's record lists among the State's Republican-signed instruments (Carlson, 1991).[^2] The at-issue record places New Heights among four nearby charter schools eligible to draw state lease aid under Minn. Stat. §124E.22. It also records that school-by-school lease-aid draws were not obtained.[^1] ## What New Heights is a charter school organized under Minn. Stat. ch. 124E.[^2] The project's record identifies §124E.22 as the provision that defines which charter schools may draw lease aid.[^1] ## When The 1991 statute that ch. 124E codifies was the first charter-school law in the nation, according to the project's record. New Heights opened two years later, in 1993.[^2][^1] ## Where The school is in Stillwater. The at-issue record places St. Croix Preparatory Academy two miles away in the same county. It places Lakes International Language Academy and North Lakes Academy in Forest Lake.[^1] ## How many The at-issue record reports these enrollments, drawn from the Minnesota charter-school directory and undated in the pack: - New Heights: 111 students - St. Croix Preparatory Academy: 1,213 - Lakes International Language Academy: 1,301 - North Lakes Academy: 599[^1] ## In the at-issue record The at-issue item states that each of the four schools is eligible to draw the lease-aid subsidy that the [[Legislative Auditor]] warned about in 2003. It anchors that eligibility in Minn. Stat. §124E.22.[^1] The record does not establish what any of the four schools actually drew. The item's own flag states that school-by-school draws were not obtained because [[Minnesota Department of Education]] finance pages blocked automated retrieval.[^1] The pack also does not carry the 2003 Legislative Auditor report itself, so its warning is reported here only as the at-issue item describes it.[^1] ## In the Minnesota record ### Who The project's record attributes the charter-school template codified in ch. 124E to the 1991 Carlson administration. It places that template in a sequence of Republican-signed instruments that includes the chapter-43A vessel (Laws 1981 c 210, Quie, 1981).[^2] The [[United States Department of Justice]] titled its January 14, 2026 release No. 26-21 "United States Department of Justice Files Lawsuit Against Minnesota's 'Affirmative Action' Regime." The pack does not connect that suit to New Heights School or to charter-school lease aid.[^3] ## Notes [^1]: Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes, *Minn. Stat. §124E.22* (current text) — primary anchor of the project's at-issue item AI-Washington-079, which identifies this section as defining which charter schools may draw lease aid. The item's figures for opening year and enrollment rest on the Minnesota charter-school directory (mncharterschools.org), which is not an allowed URL in the pack. https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/cite/124E.22 [^2]: Minnesota Office of the Revisor of Statutes, *Minn. Stat. ch. 124E* (current text) — charter-school law codifying the 1991 first-in-nation charter statute (Carlson), as recorded in the project's validated passage [17] (primary-confirmed via revisor.mn.gov). https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/cite/124E.22 [^3]: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Public Affairs, *United States Department of Justice Files Lawsuit Against Minnesota's 'Affirmative Action' Regime*, release No. 26-21 (Jan. 14, 2026) — title of the release; Attorney General Pamela Bondi certified the case as a matter of general public importance. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/united-states-department-justice-files-lawsuit-against-minnesotas-affirmative-action-regime