The Texas Education Agency is investigating the attendance records of an area charter school and has recommended a financial audit.

DeEtta Culbertson, TEA spokeswoman, said this week that the agency is conducting an attendance audit of The Education Center, which operates campuses in Little Elm, Lewisville, The Colony and Denton. A new campus is scheduled to open Aug. 25 in Aubrey, northeast of Denton.

Culbertson said the financial audit would look at whether records were falsified, school staff profited from the sale of items to students and school property was misused. The state is looking into the school after receiving a complaint in June. Culbertson said she could not elaborate on the nature of the attendance audit or who filed the complaint because the matter is considered an open investigation.

A sister campus in Temple, which goes by Temple Education Center and operates under a separate state charter, is also under TEA scrutiny. Last October, the state notified school officials that it was assigning a monitor because the school earned an academically unacceptable rating for two consecutive years.

Nick Farley, superintendent of both schools, said this week that he was surprised to learn of the state’s inquiry.

“It’s a funny thing to me they would do that because our audits have always been excellent,” he said.

Raquel Perry, the school’s attorney, said the school is cooperating with the state and submitting the requested documents.

“We are confident there will be no improprieties on behalf of The Education Center,” she said. “The audit is just following up on the complaint. ... TEA has to follow its own guidelines.”

Culbertson said TEA is following normal protocol but added that the agency doesn’t initiate audits if there isn’t cause for concern.

“Every complaint is looked at individually, and if we feel there’s sufficient cause to launch an audit, we will go ahead and do it,” she said.

Kirsten Moody, the state monitor, recommended in June that she continue to provide oversight at the Temple campus. She said areas of concern include teacher qualifications and curriculum that is not fully in line with what the state thinks students should be learning. Low TAKS scores in reading, writing, math, science and social studies are also problems, she said.

Moody’s June report said the Temple campus had met its target for raising TAKS scores in reading, social studies and writing, but not in math and science.

This latest investigation follows recent news reports of problems at other charter schools. TEA said Tuesday that it was investigating allegations of cheating on the 2008 Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills at Jesse Jackson Academy in Houston. The agency is also investigating whether the school cheated on the 2005 TAKS test.

Charter schools operate with public money based on the number of students in attendance. Charters, however, are not subject to many of the state regulations that traditional public schools have to follow. The idea is that charter schools give parents an alternative to regular public schools.

Lynacre Academy, a south Dallas charter school, closed its doors Feb. 1 after going into debt and filing for bankruptcy. State officials discovered the school had miscalculated student attendance over several years, which resulted in the state overpaying the school $750,000.