BENTONVILLE — The question of exactly where a new charter school will be located when it opens in August has not been settled.
Northwest Arkansas Classical Academy officials initially identified 5121 S.W. Runway Drive as the building they would lease for the school when they applied to the state Board of Education for approval last year.
Since then, however, officials have identified another site in Bentonville that fits their needs better.
“We do have a tentative lease agreement at a facility that will afford us the ability to accommodate all 445 kids,” said Virginia Perry, a director with Responsive Education Solutions, a Texas-based organization that will run the charter school. “This new facility is awesome.”
Perry declined to disclose the site. The state Board of Education must approve the site before the lease is finalized. The board likely will consider the matter at its meeting May 13, Perry said.
Fast Facts
Northwest Arkansas Classical Academy
• The charter school plans to open with grades kindergarten through eight and add one grade level per year.
• It will be tuition-free.
• It will not have academic or residency requirements.
• It will not be affiliated with any religion.
• Curriculum will be based in the classical liberal arts and sciences with emphasis on the great ideas of world civilization.
• Students will wear uniforms.
• The school will follow Bentonville’s traditional school calendar.
Source: Staff Report
Joe Quinn, a Bentonville resident who will serve on Northwest Arkansas Classical Academy’s board, said the site is large enough to handle not only all of its students the first year, but also growth that could come in the next few years.
“It’s also centrally located,” Quinn said.
The building on Runway Drive is in southwest Bentonville near a Walmart Distribution Center.
Public charter schools are public schools of choice that operate free from many of the regulations that apply to traditional public schools, according to the Arkansas Department of Education. The charter establishing each school is a performance contract detailing the school’s mission, program, goals, students served and methods of assessment.
Northwest Arkansas Classical Academy received 910 applications for its 445 available slots during the open enrollment period last month. A lottery will be held at 6 p.m. Friday at NorthWest Arkansas Community College’s White Auditorium at Burns Hall to determine which students will be invited to enroll. Remaining names will be drawn and placed on a waiting list in the order they are drawn.
About 80 percent of the school’s applications came from students in the Bentonville School District. If that percentage is reflected in the school’s enrollment this fall, about 350 of its students will come from the Bentonville district.
The district is dealing with significant growth at all levels. Total enrollment grew by 760 students this school year, an increase of 5.4 percent from the year before.
Quinn said Bentonville is running a great school district. He attributes interest in the charter school to the district’s space and size issues.
“We have 15,000 students in the Bentonville district, and we’re struggling each year to understand how to keep up with the growth,” Quinn said. “For as big as our district is and as fast as it’s growing, in some ways it’s surprising there haven’t been more education options in the past.”
Responsive Education Solutions oversees 60 schools in Texas. It is expanding outside Texas for the first time this year with three schools in Arkansas and one in Indiana.
The Benton County School of the Arts in Rogers is the only charter school in Benton County.