Wise schools explore UVa-Wise Academy for gifted students
WISE — The Wise County School Board on Monday took under consideration a potential new partnership with the University of Virginia’s College at Wise for academically advanced high school students.
During Monday’s board session, School Superintendent Jeff Perry provided the broad outlines of a program pitched to the school division by the college to establish a UVa-Wise Academy.
As currently envisioned, Perry said the program would be “somewhat of a magnet school for our top academic students,” with a select group — limited to 24 — of high school seniors chosen to take college courses at UVa-Wise. Courses would include physics, calculus, literature, chemistry and biology, Perry said.
Recent consolidation of county high schools achieved one goal of offering dual-enrollment courses at the three high schools. Students, particularly in Wise and Big Stone Gap, have taken those courses at UVa-Wise and Mountain Empire Community College in the past. The arrangement posed an ongoing problem for the school division keeping track of high school students on college campuses and their academic progress.
School board member Betty Cornett asked Perry if MECC shouldn’t be considered a part of the “Academy” program as well. Perry said UVa-Wise contacted the school division about an idea that might be funded with Board of Supervisors math and science initiative funds. Supervisors launched the initiative in partnership with UVa-Wise a few years ago with initial $100,000 annual payouts to cover the cost.
Appalachia’s Mark Hutchinson said the “Academy” is dual enrollment by another name and backed Cornett’s desire to explore a similar program with MECC.
“It’s dual enrollment is what it is,” he said. “We might want to see what MECC might offer.”
On Tuesday, UVa-Wise spokeswoman Kathy Still confirmed the college “started the conversation with the school system” as an outgrowth of internal discussions involving the AIMS Higher program at MECC. Some students preferred to attend UVa-Wise rather than MECC under AIMS, she said.
“Some students first wanted to start at a four-year college, so from that conversation we began a discussion about summer camps here for eighth- graders and up. The governor likes it, and we’re still on track to get that program started,” Still said.
“And from that conversation about grades eight through 11 students, there were discussions about offering courses here, taught by college professors with dual-enrollment credit, and students would be invited to participate with maybe a minimum GPA of 3.5 or 3.4,” Still said. “We’re looking to pilot that for next year for juniors and seniors, and looking to partner that with the school division.”
Still said the college recognizes the value of the AIMS program, centered at MECC, as well.
“We want to continue the partnership with AIMS. It’s a valuable program, but there have been students instead of AIMS who really would rather go to a four-year school right away. So we’re just looking to see what we could do along those lines,” she said. “We’ve had several students in that (AIMS) program who basically wanted to come here, and that’s basically how the conversation started.”
Perry said the school division wants to limit UVa-Wise Academy participation because it is a manageable class size, with all students in the select “cohort” together for all classes at UVa-Wise. That would avoid past concerns about keeping track of high school students attending classes away from their schools, he said, and provide a better means of tracking their academic progress as well.
Perry said the school division invests “a lot of money” for special education and at-risk programs, and the “academically gifted and talented probably get less than anybody” to address their needs for a more challenging educational experience. The Academy cost is expected to be less than $53,000 annually for 24 students, he said.
Cornett asked Perry to ask MECC officials if they could duplicate the Academy program “or they may offer a better deal.”
Perry said her suggestion may be unwieldy and a return to the old problem of keeping up with students on two college campuses.
“If we try to divide this program between the two (colleges), I think it would destroy (the effectiveness and intent) of a single cohort,” Perry said.
In other matters, Cornett also complained about Central High School availing itself of UVa-Wise athletic facilities like the college’s football stadium and the Convocation Center. Cornett said she gets “calls every day” from her Big Stone Gap constituents about Central teams utilizing college facilities at taxpayer expense.
Perry said Central’s principal has the autonomy to make those decisions, and school activity funds — not taxpayer dollars — are used to rent the college’s facilities for Central athletic or other extracurricular events. The activity funds are typically raised from athletic contest gate receipts and community fund-raisers, he said.
The college rents its stadium and new indoor arena for just $500 per event to the high school, Perry said, and Central’s own activity funds are not only healthy enough to pay the freight, but the school more than replenishes those funds from even more robust gate receipts collected at the college’s facilities.
“They came out ahead on football,” Perry said, and his administration feels “fairly comfortable” with permitting the Central principal to retain the autonomy held by all high school principals to choose a venue that suits the needs of the school’s teams and supporters.
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