Virtual charter schools will face restrictions if they want to open up in North Carolina.

The N.C. State Board of Education voted today to adopt a policy that would require the online-based schools to adhere to a significantly lower funding formula ($3504 per student) than brick-and-mortar charter schools, maintain high graduation rates and low withdrawal rates of students. Schools will also need to keep a ratio of one teacher for every 50 students and keep graduation rates within 10 percent of the state average (80 percent), and can’t have withdrawal rates higher than 15 percent in two out of three years.

Committee leaders for the legislature’s education committee took issue late last year with the state board making policies about virtual charter schools, saying that the board didn’t have the authority to tinker with funding formulas or single out online-based schools. Bill Harrison, the chairman of the N.C. Board of Education who will faces a likely replacement from new Gov. Pat McCrory, disagreed. (Read our story about that tiff here.)

The legislature, of course, could undo the state board’s decision if they choose.

The state currently has no virtual charter schools, though the state does operate the N.C. Virtual Public School, wich allows high-school students (and some middle-school students) to take individual classes as part of their regular studies.

Virtual charter schools have shown a keen interest in North Carolina. Two national online learning companies have sent letters of intent to the N.C. Department of Public Instruction that they want to open up their doors in 2014: Connections Academy, owned by the for-profit education company Pearson and N.C. Virtual Academy, to be run by the for-profit K12, Inc.

K12, Inc., through a non-profit organization called N.C. Learns set up by K12, tried to open up in the state last year, and had their application ignored by the N.C. State Board of Education, which authorizes charter schools in the state. The matter is now tied up in the appellate courts, with N.C. Learns appealing a lower judge’s ruling affirming the state board’s denial. State Sen. Fletcher Hartsell, a prominent Republican legislator, was hired on as N.C. Learn’s attorney for the case and K12 has hired another former lawmaker, Jeff Barnhart, as a lobbyist, according to the N.C. Secretary of State’s office.

Pearson has lobbyists of its own – four were hired from Capstrat, the Raleigh-based lobbying firm.

Here’s the new policy adopted by the N.C. State Board of Education:

Policy for N.C. virtual charter schools by ncpolicywatch