News

Fourteen planning groups awarded grants to promote development of quality charter schools

February 28, 2008

Fourteen organizations from across South Carolina have been awarded $5,000 grants to help them develop quality charter school applications. Groups that are successful in gaining charters during 2008 will be eligible to receive grant funds up to $200,000 to assist with initial costs associated with opening new charter schools in August 2009.

The sub-grants were awarded by the South Carolina Department of Education from Charter School Program funds received from the U.S. Department of Education to support the creation of additional high-quality charter schools.  The funds were also designated to assist the Palmetto State in disseminating information about charter school planning, design and implementation.

"High-quality charter schools let parents, teachers and community members create innovative and flexible ways to educate children within the public school system," said State Superintendent of Education James Rex.  "These grants are one way that we can help community groups who want to give this option a try.”

Charter schools are public schools, designed and operated with significant autonomy by educators, parents, community leaders, educational entrepreneurs and others. They are sponsored either by local school district boards of trustees or the South Carolina Public Charter School District’s board of trustees.  The sponsoring boards then monitor charter school quality and effectiveness.

Charter schools also operate with some freedom from local mandates, state laws and regulations.  They are designed to increase learning opportunities for students; encourage the use of various productive teaching methods; establish new forms of school accountability; create professional opportunities for teachers; and assist the state in reaching academic excellence.

In 1996, the South Carolina General Assembly approved legislation allowing the development of charter schools within the state's system of public education.  South Carolina's 29 charter schools serve approximately 5,200 public school students.

2008 sub-grantees’ mission statements

Bamberg Charter School for Academic Excellence, Grades K-5 (expanding to K-12)
To implement recorded personalized educational programs to facilitate student achievement utilizing educational reform that will serve as a catalyst to provide change in the way teachers and students learn. Target population will be students in Bamberg Districts One and Two.

Blue Ocean Charter Academy, Statewide, Grades K-12
To serve as a virtual charter school open to the entire state population of students.  To offer students the flexibility of virtual instruction that is delivered in the comfort and safety of their own home environment and that allows students to learn at their own pace and with personalized support.

Carolina Preparatory Academy, North Charleston, Grades K-3 (expanding to K-12)
To create an educational environment that is safe, nurturing, academically rigorous, globally conscious, and promotes a culture of college-bound students. Target population will be at-risk students living in neighborhoods adjacent to the North Charleston Navy Yard.

Carolina Central Charter School, Aiken, Grades K4-5 (expanding to K4-8)To provide a challenging educational program focused on allowing children to learn through individual projects and group collaboration. To create a center-based learning environment that will encourage project-guided educational experiences to develop character, a sense of community support, and faith in their own success.

Horizon Middle Academy, Johns Island (SCPCSD), Grades 6-8
To serve students who thrive in a more individualized and holistic setting. To provide a rigorous academic program that is relevant and meaningful to each student, to equip each student with 21st-Century skills for success in high school and beyond, to support genuine and healthy relationships, and to encourage global awareness and environmental stewardship.

Jonesville Lockhart Charter School, Union, (SCPCSD) Grades K-12
To provide a safe learning environment that enables all students to achieve their best, while also challenging these students to become lifelong learners, independent thinkers, respectful individuals, and responsible citizens, thus preparing them for a 21st-Century global economy.

Nu Vision School of Excellence, Lee, Grades 9-12
To provide a safe environment where each individual is accepted, supported, valued and challenged to work up to their full potential. To enable students to become totally self-aware and seamlessly integrated in society. To offer an academically challenging, developmentally appropriate, experiential, holistic, child-centered education to all young people.

Riverview Charter School, Beaufort
To provide a small, nurturing setting that actively engages students in authentic, meaningful, and integrated learning experiences. To create an academic environment that is both joyful and rigorous, providing students with diverse experience-based opportunities to demonstrate and strengthen their individual intelligences and become personally, socially, and globally responsible citizens.

S. L. Finley Alternative School, Chester, Grades 9-12
To create a center-based learning environment that will encourage project-guided and community-based educational experiences utilizing innovative strategies that lead to the improvement of student academic achievement, attendance, and to motivate students to achieve their full potential by developing faith in their own success to become actively engaged in the learning process. The educational program will focus on allowing children to learn through natural experiences and investigation.

South Carolina Connections Academy, SCPCSD, Grades K-12
To provide individualized instruction tailored to the learning needs of students throughout South Carolina who seek an alternative to the traditional classroom. The virtual learning approach is a choice for under-served students who have chronic illness, who are gifted or struggling, those living in isolated rural areas with limited access to rich curriculum resources, students with special education needs, and children who simply learn differently.

South Carolina Virtual Charter School, SCPCSD, Grades K-12
To add a needed, innovative, research-based, and effective model of virtual education to the state’s public education system that combines web-based and offline lessons. To utilize technology to provide a new and individualized South Carolina Academic Standards-based education for students across the state.

The Apple Charter School, Charleston, Grades 3-8
To educate students in a stable, consistent single-gender environment while preparing them for higher education and maximizing their potential for success in an ever changing world.

West End Academy, Greenville, Grades K5-5
To provide a quality educational experience that will develop and enhance the intellectual and artistic abilities of its students in an inquisitive, child-centered environment. To offer a curriculum that is inquiry-based, using project-based learning that integrates academic and artistic competencies for real-world applications.

William Edward School of Technology, Charleston, Grades K-8 (expanding to K-12)
To promote technology as an avenue for success among students. To increase high school and college graduation rates, employment opportunities, masterly levels of technology usage, and community awareness. To equip students with the skills necessary to succeed in any industry, at any post-secondary institution, and/or with any entrepreneurial endeavor.

South Carolina Department of Education