Plan moves forward for charter elementary

SANDPOINT — If a small but impassioned group of board members gets its way, a charter elementary school could be joining the educational options currently offered to local charter school students in middle and high school grades.

“It’s a long process and we’re still putting our charter application together,” said Lorri Goodman, who originated the concept and plans to act as principal once the school gets off the ground. “Right now, we’re looking toward the 2016-17 school year.”

If successful in attracting local support and receiving state approval, the Sandpoint Elementary Charter School of the Arts would serve students from full-day kindergarten through fifth grade, according to Jennifer Fullerton, a board member and parent who hopes to enroll her youngest son in the school. Her oldest, she added, already attends Forrest M. Bird Charter School in Sandpoint.

“A charter elementary school would give us the difference we need in the community — a different type of education at the K-5 level,” said Fullerton.

“It’s not meant to be a competitor with other elementary schools, just to create more options,” Goodman interjected.

The future principal listed her educational background as including 15 years of classroom teaching, much of it spent in the tough school environment of southeast Los Angeles. When she moved to Cocolalla in 2006, Goodman began home-schooling her children and soon was asked to add the children of friends to her home-based classes.

“Thus, the ‘Schoolhouse in the Woods’ was born,” she said.

In the past three years, Goodman’s home school, which now includes a staff of four, has grown from just a handful of students to enrollment of a dozen kids ages 3-10 in the current school year.

“Next year, we’ll have 17 students,” she said.

The concept of teaching through the arts came into play as the school grew in size and Goodman began to serve different ages of students. She plans to carry that same approach to the charter school.

“We are going to provide a rigorous academic environment that involves visual art, dance, music and drama in an integrative, hands-on way,” said Goodman.

The tenets of the school’s teaching style would be “active learning, mindfulness, integrated curriculum units and using multiple senses to learn,” she added.

“That way, the lesson becomes more real to them,” Goodman said, explaining that a single activity can have applications across different subject areas. “I can imagine a room with several sewing machines where kids are learning about math and measurement while they sew the costumes they’ll use to act in the play that’s part of their social studies unit.”

Taking a different tack already has helped bridge the learning gap for kids with specific educational needs, according to Goodman. In one case, a hands-on encounter with nature was the key to unlocking a sticky math concept for a student on the autism spectrum.

“This student had been struggling with fractions for some time,” she said. “We have chickens that we take care of at the school and working with things like the cost of feed and how much feed to give the chickens was the thing that led to an understanding of how fractions work.

“We plan to have a special education department in our elementary charter school,” Goodman explained. “And I think mainstream and integration is the best way for those kids to learn — they need to be in the same classroom learning the same things. You just have to create a more differentiated lesson when you need to reach more students.”

According to Fullerton, the Sandpoint Elementary Charter School of the Arts would “not be affiliated with, but would be in line with” the current Forrest M. Bird Charter Schools as far as teaching philosophy. Class sizes would remain small — limited to a cap of about 20 students. The elementary charter school board also plans to provide school lunches and bus transportation, Fullerton said.

Goodman, who is simultaneously working on a master’s degree and administrative certificate, hopes to find a physical location near the existing charter schools, where she can prepare younger students for a smooth hand-off to that organization’s unique, project-based learning environment.

“I think going through the arts in the early years will only enhance their study of the sciences later on,” she said.

Although heavily predicated in the arts, the staff at the elementary charter school will not necessarily be certified in those teaching areas – something that is required in other public schools. Asked if her teaching staff would be required to have some kind of arts background, Goodman replied:

“Yes and no. I like to work with people from the community who come in and help teach — people who play for us and help us to learn.”

The Sandpoint Elementary Charter School of the Arts board of directors includes five members, from what Fullerton described as a cross-section of former educators, school counselors, business people and fundraising specialists.

“One thing we want people to know is that charter schools are public schools and that they are free,” Fullerton said, pointing out that charters also are funded by state taxpayer dollars. “They are not expensive private schools.”

The next board meeting for the Sandpoint Elementary Charter School of the Arts is scheduled for this Wednesday, April 16, at 6 p.m. in the Panhandle Health District building, located at 322 Marion Ave. in Sandpoint. The meeting is open to all interested parties.

n For more information, e-mail Goodman at: goodmanlorri@gmail.com