Bartow Schools Look to Fund Career Center

have been entertaining the idea of putting a career academy center in the old Cass High building on Grassdale Road, however, only one thing stopping them — funding.

Superintendent John Harper said during the Board of Education's business meeting Monday the school system sent their Chief Financial Officer Todd Hooper along with the Cartersville Chamber of Commerce last week to meet with lawmakers in Washington D.C. to try to find funding for the career academy project.

“We've been working on it since we left the building in January, trying to find the funding which we are unable to do, so we've been trying to find funding outside of the funding that we get,” said Harper. “We're trying to find a grant to be able to make that work for us."

Harper said the addition of a career center would be most useful for high school students who were interested in learning a trade instead of just following through the current school system curriculum. The career center would be designed so those students “who want an out of the classroom setting” could leave their schools during set times to pursue vocational study similar to programs found in technical colleges.

“You take kids who are currently in our high school program who say they want to follow a very definite career track and we'll put some of those career tracks in that building,” said Harper. “What we were really hoping to do was piggyback with Chattahoochee Tech and let them locate here.”

Currently there are no plans to pair up with CTC, and Harper said the school system now is looking into providing its own teaching staff to bring kids there and that students would still graduate high school with a diploma.

“Students would still be in the schools where they come from,” said Harper. “They would still graduate with their school, however, we'd just have them housed in a different building.”

Harper said the board's decision to ask for federal financial aides was because current budgeting would not allow for self-funding, and it was very pleased with Hooper's findings.

“In this economy it's hard to go up and visit with a congressman and say 'Hey, I need three or four million dollars,' and he or she say, 'Oh, it's not a problem. Here, let me write you a check.'”

Hooper said the Chamber-sponsored trip allowed him one-on-one with local representative Phil Gingery, where he was able to talk about the desired renovations to the old Cass High, as well as funding.

“He was very tentative and very interested in what we had to say,” said Hooper. “There are no earmarks for a lot of the pet projects they've had in the past, but one of the things they did do was to commit to their staff working with us once we had applied for the appropriate grant to try and start funding the facility over here.”

Hooper added that most federal funding for educational purposes is for personnel, education and curriculum.

“There is no bricks and mortar funding, so to speak,” said Hooper, “but once we seek out those types of grants, they promised to put the right people in front of the right education department to put those requests through.”

Also discussed in Monday's meeting:

• Bartow County congratulated it's salutatorians and valedictorians from its high schools. They are as follows: Adairsville High School — salutatorian Torri Nicholas Tate and valedictorian – Stephanie Elizabeth Freeman; Cass High School — salutatorian Veronica Betancourt and valedictorian Jessica Lynn Tracy; and Woodland High School — salutatorian Anna Norman and valedictorian Alex Kollhoff.
• The board also announced that Media Specialist Lori Pilgrim of Kingston Elementary School is Employee of the Month. Pilgrim received a one-night stay at Barnsley Gardens.
• The board unanimously approved all of the agenda items on its consent agenda, which is attached to this article, including a new strategic plan for the school system, supplemental reading textbooks for third-graders, a search for a new third-party administrator for the workers compensation contract, a new chain-link fence for Cloverleaf Elementary, updated camera systems on the transportation vehicles and buses, contract renewals and a contract with NOVA Engineering to provide subsurface geotechnical exploration and report as well as construction materials testing for Adairsville Middle School project.