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Board approves three facility changes for the 2018-19 school year, including a temporary home for the new W.E.B. DuBois Academy
By Toni Konz Tatman | JCPS Communications
A facilities plan that will combine the district’s two Teenage Parent Programs (TAPPs), expand early childhood education centers and create a temporary home for the new W.E.B. DuBois Academy was approved by the Jefferson County Board of Education on Tuesday night.
The changes, which will take place at the start of the 2018-19 year, include:
- Combining Westport TAPP and South Park TAPP at the South Park location in Fairdale.
- Creating an early childhood center for pre-kindergarten children at the Westport TAPP building, 8800 Westport Road.
- Housing the new W.E.B. DuBois Academy at Gheens Academy, 4425 Preston Highway, for the 2018-19 year, with plans to move it to a permanent location for the 2019-20 school year.
Acting Superintendent Marty Pollio said over the course of the next three board meetings, he will be “bringing recommendations around facilities changes for 2018-19 to accomplish the goals that were set out over a year ago.”
“The first round of facility changes reflects our desire to increase services to students by consolidating some programs, increasing early childhood centers throughout the county and finding a first-year home for Dubois Academy,” Pollio said.
“This is only the beginning of our facility changes,” he said. “We will be bringing at least one more round of recommendations for the 2018-19 year in upcoming meetings and we also will lay out a plan for major facility changes for 2019-20 and 2020-21.”
The DuBois Academy is being designed to help serve and meet the needs of young males of color. It will serve 150 sixth graders in its inaugural class and grow into a sixth- through eighth- grade academy after three years.
DuBois will offer an Afrocentric, multicultural curriculum and an innovative learning environment, with each student receiving a Chromebook or an iPad. The core tenets of the program will emphasize academic skills such as leadership, literacy, numeracy, social sciences, technology usage and speaking a foreign language. The DuBois Academy will serve as a model school for the district, where other teachers and administrators can visit and learn practices that will help close the achievement gap across the district.
You can read more about the school here.
The next school board meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. on March 13.
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