Basis Schools
an Arizonan charter school operator
BASIS Curriculum Schools, Inc. is a global network of public and private schools that use the BASIS Curriculum. BASIS Curriculum Schools are made up of BASIS Charter Schools, BASIS Independent Schools, and BASIS International Schools.
History
The first BASIS Curriculum School, BASIS Tucson, was founded in Tucson in 1998 by Michael Block and Olga Block, intending to educate students at an internationally competitive level.
In 2003, BASIS Scottsdale was opened. In 2010, BASIS Oro Valley was founded. A year later, BASIS opened three schools at once in Chandler, Peoria, and Flagstaff. BASIS continued its expansion by opening another school in Tucson and one in Phoenix proper in fall 2012, along with their first non-Arizona school, located in Washington, D.C. In 2013, BASIS opened its tenth and eleventh Arizona campuses in Ahwatukee and Mesa, and the second non-Arizona campus was added in San Antonio, Texas. BASIS also began its primary (K-4) program at the original BASIS Tucson site. In 2014, BASIS opened in Prescott, AZ. In 2015, BASIS opened its sixteenth Arizona school in Goodyear, AZ. In the following year, BASIS Independent McLean opened in McLean, VA.
BASIS was featured in the documentary film 2 Million Minutes: A 21st Century Solution, which examined differences between charter schools' curricula and conventional public schools.
The public source identifies “Basis Schools” as an Arizonan charter school operator. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Basis, Schools and Arizonan.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Basis Schools”, the useful work is to connect “an Arizonan charter school operator” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 6, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4834666. The first chronological checks are 1998, 2003, 2010 and 2012.
Later summaries often reconcile disputed chronology or motive more neatly than the contemporary record permits. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.
- Event chronology
- Institutional context
- Locating named record creators
Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Basis Schools”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Basis Schools primary sources, Basis Schools archive and Basis research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Basis Schools” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.