Vineland Public Charter School expands through 12th grade

Deborah M. Marko
The Daily Journal
Kids stand outside in formation, Friday, Sept , 22, 2017,  during the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for the new Vineland Public Charter School, Vineland. N.J.

VINELAND - The Vineland Public Charter School can now offer students a pre-K through 12th-grade education.

The state Department of Education notified the school officials that their charter was renewed based on “academic performance, fiscal viability and operational stability.”

“Now we are renewed another five years until June 2023,” the school’s executive director Ann Garcia recently told The Daily Journal.

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“They also approved us for 11th and 12th grade,” Garcia said, noting Vineland Public Charter School is the lone charter school in Cumberland County to offer a pre-K through high school program.

Until this recent approval, the charter school was approved up to 10th grade, which it currently offers.

“Because of the renewal process, they don’t go past your renewal date,” Garcia said. “This is our renewal year, so next year we can expand to 11th and 12th grade and we are.”

These new upper classes will be phased in one year at time, with 60 slots allocated for each grade.

“We are going to have some open houses and have some meetings with our current parents to see where they feel the needs are,” the executive director said.

“I’m willing to entertain anything that comes up,” Garcia said, adding she plans to stay to course by offering small class sizes.  

The Vineland Public Charter School officials are optimistic the approved expansion will help recruit more high school students.

“Because we never had the approval to 12th grade, it’s been very hard to attract parents,” Garcia said.

State education officials also approved the move of the school’s pre-K program from rented facilities at Beth Israel Congregation of East Park Avenue to its new school at 1480 Pennsylvania Avenue.

The lease ended Dec. 31.

“We built classrooms for pre-K,” Garcia said. “We are approved for four classes but because of the low student population in Vineland, we only have two classrooms.”

Vineland Public Charter School, the first charter school in Cumberland County, opened in 2009 and grew to include a network of leased locations.

This school year, the staff and students officially celebrated the opening of their 35,778-square-foot newly constructed school, although they’d moved into the building last April.

“Everything now is under one roof,” Garcia said.

But that may change with the addition of the two new grades.

“For next year, we are probably going to look at a satellite site for the high school program,” Garcia said. “That is something we need to talk to the parents about.”

The Millville Public Charter School, the VPCS’s sister school, is currently kindergarten through 8th grade.  It was recently approved to add 9th and 10th grade, which will be phased in starting next year.

With district of residency agreements, Millville students are eligible to attend the Vineland charter school high school program.

“Initially, we opened with a K-4 approach but through the years with the test scores of the district and parents needing choice, we pretty much moved in this direction,” Garcia said. “I’m delighted with the ability to open a high school.”

Charter schools are publicly funded and are not tuition schools. The per-child cost of educating a student follows the youngster from the school district to the charter school.

Deborah M. Marko: @dmarko_dj; 856-563-5256; dmarko@gannettnj.com

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