The state Charter Authorizing Panel on Tuesday endorsed a new charter school in Northwest Arkansas that would focus on high school dropouts and on students falling off the track to graduate.
The panel's decision will be reviewed by the state Board of Education at a later date. If it passes review, Premier High School of Springdale would accommodate 9th-through-12th graders who are either at-risk of dropping out or who have already dropped out and live in the Springdale, Rogers, Fayetteville and Farmington school districts.
The school would open in the 2021-2022 school year with a projected 100 students from Springdale alone.
Responsive Education Solutions, the charter school's parent company, opened similar dropout/recovery schools to the one proposed in Springdale in Little Rock in 2013 and North Little Rock in 2019. The school would develop individual lesson plans, graduation projection plans and postsecondary education goals for the students.
Read Wednesday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for more details.