CABOT — There isn’t much to the interior of the school off Bill Foster Memorial Highway in Cabot. While most schools have classrooms, lockers, a cafeteria and a gymnasium, this building is filled with rows and rows of tables with computers. But that doesn’t mean the school’s students are not successful. In fact, this school with its computers means success for students who may otherwise not have had a chance to graduate.
The Cabot Public School District’s Academic Center of Excellence — or ACE — is a conversion charter school that gives students in grades seven through 12 a flexible schedule to help them succeed in meeting educational requirements.
The school utilizes various methods, such as Apex digital curriculum, Blackboard classes, project-based learning, classroom instruction and core-specific focus groups, to help students complete their classes. The students are self-paced to keep with the flexible schedule aspect of the school.
Students who go to ACE come from different situations that make a regular school schedule impossible to keep. Some students have medical issues that require testing or treatment. Others are competitive athletes who spend a lot of time on the road going to meets or games. There are even students at ACE who work and take care of their families but are still striving to finish their high school education.
Emily McGee said she doesn’t know if she would have been able to stay on track and graduate on time if it wasn’t for ACE. The National Merit finalist has been dealing with an undiagnosed medical condition since the summer between her sophomore and junior years.
“I started having strange symptoms like bad headaches and dizzy spells,” she said. “They couldn’t figure what was going on. The second weekend of school my junior year, I went to a concert with one of my friends in Dallas, and I was walking in the parking lot, and I almost passed out in the middle of all of these people.”
McGee went back to her doctor for more testing, and she said the doctor found that she was extremely anemic.
“We had to go to the hospital, and they told me I should be comatose at that point,” she said. “They still don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
Eventually, a friend suggested that McGee check out ACE. Before then, McGee didn’t know much about the school, but she said she was encouraged to find out that she could stay in her Advanced Placement classes and school clubs, yet have a schedule that wouldn’t penalize her for taking off a lot of time for medical reasons.
“I didn’t know everything about ACE,” she said. “Last year, I was just thinking about getting through the year. Starting senior year was rough — I missed three days in the first two weeks of school — and I knew I needed an alternative.”
Despite traveling for medical tests and needing blood transfusions every three to four weeks, McGee will graduate Friday with the rest of her class.
“ACE has been basically a pathway to success for me,” she said. “Without ACE, I really don’t know if I would have been able to finish school. I missed so much, and there were times I thought, ‘How am I going to do this?’ It was just so overwhelming.”
McGee hasn’t just succeeded in high school. She has gone above and beyond with scholarly achievements. One of her proudest accomplishments has been being named a National Merit Finalist, she said.
“I took my test (the Preliminary SAT, used to determine National Merit scholars) on my birthday, and right after the test was over, I went to Arkansas Children’s Hospital to get a blood transfusion. I was sick that day,” she said. “I’m proud of myself.”
McGee has earned a scholarship to Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia and intends to pursue a dual degree in English and history.
On graduation day, Kennedy Verbeck will also don a cap and gown to receive her diploma. The 20-year-old is one example of how the staff at ACE does not give up on students, even when it seems the students have given up on themselves.
Verbeck moved from Conway to Cabot when she was 16, and she said she didn’t fit in at her new school. She talked to her counselor about some of the problems she was having, and her counselor suggested that she check out ACE.
“You have to fill out an application and do an interview to go here,” she said. “Then they lay out all of your classes for you.”
After about a year and a half of going to school at ACE, Verbeck said, she started hanging out with a bad crowd and eventually dropped out of school.
“I got myself into a really bad way of life,” she said. “In the course of me dropping out, I wound up with five Class B felonies when I had just turned 18. Part of my probation was that I had to get my diploma or GED.”
Verbeck returned to ACE, but she returned to a bad lifestyle and dropped out of school a second time. The staff at ACE wasn’t ready to write her off. Last year, Verbeck had just completed rehab when her mother got a call from someone at ACE to let her know that Verbeck was only two or three classes away from graduation.
After reapplying to ACE, it only took a couple of months for Verbeck to finish her classes. She said she is thankful the staff at ACE never gave up on her.
“Me and my mom are close — my mom is my best friend — but 90 percent of the teachers at ACE have also been like moms to me. They made sure I was doing my work. They always looked out for me. They understood the rare state I was in, having just come out of rehab and trying to get my head on my shoulders. They never gave up on me.”
In April this year, Verbeck celebrated one year clean from drugs. She will graduate later this month, and she and her fiance are expecting
their first child this summer.
“Being clean is my top priority in life, and being a mother is going to fall right in line with that,” she said. “I didn’t want my child or my four younger siblings to look at me and say ‘Kennedy didn’t do it, so I shouldn’t have to.’ I want them to understand that if you get knocked down, you get right back up.”
Beverly Williams, senior adviser at ACE, was one of the instructors who would not give up on Verbeck. Williams said she makes it a point to call her students if they miss three days in a row, and she is thankful for her students who have worked hard to succeed.
“I’m very proud,” she said.
For more information on ACE, including how to apply, visit www.cabotschools.org/schools/academic-center-of-excellence.