Future School awarded $1.25 million grant

The Future School of Fort Smith will be receiving almost $1.25 million to help expand the school to include ninth grade.

In April, the school received authorization for the state Charter School Authorizing Panel, which oversees the authorization renewal, revision and revocation of charters in Arkansas to accept ninth-grade students for the 2021-22 school year, adding to its 10th, 11th and 12th grade classes.

Trish Flanagan, chief growth officer for the Future School and the founder/CEO of Think Future, said Tuesday (May 26) that school received a just under $1.25 million federal charter school program expansion grant to help add that ninth grade class.

“This allows us to take what we are doing to the next level, to iron out some of the kinks and to improve the model for high school in Arkansas and in the nation,” Flanagan said, noting the Arkansas Public School Resource Center helped the school get the grant “this round.”

She said support the school is receiving even during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic shows there is a belief in what the school is working to accomplish and is a “challenge to get public school up to speed.”

The school opened its doors Aug. 22, 2016 in downtown Fort Smith as a tuition-free, public charter high school centered on a personalized approach to learning via student-designed internships, personalized learning plans, and an advisor for each student. It now serves students in 10th through 12th grade and graduated its first class of seniors in May 2019.

The school’s board approved a $5.8 million building expansion Jan. 21. The expansion will add 18,000 square feet to the existing school, which is now 16,000 square feet. At the time the addition was approved, Superintendent Boyd Logan said the expansion would replace modular buildings the school uses and add enough classroom space that the school can open to ninth grade students. But they first had to have approval. Logan said he had to present to the panel why they wanted to expand the school’s reach and justify why it is needed.

The school anticipates about 65 ninth-grade students in the first year, with a goal of having 100 in each grade within a few years for a total enrollment of 400, he said. Enrollment is now 225, with 75 seniors, and perhaps a couple of early graduating juniors, graduating at the end of the semester.

Enrollment is open for the 2020-21 school year. Ninth-grade will not begin at the school until the 2021-22 school year. Administration expects to break ground on the expansion in July or August, with a building completion date in August 2021. That would allow the school to be open to freshmen at the same time the new freshmen centers open at both Fort Smith Public Schools high schools – Northside High School and Southside High School.