Program for At-Risk Students
Administrators at the Bridgehampton School are planning to launch an alternative high school program in September to bring at-risk students back home and, at the same time, save money.
Lois Favre, Bridgehampton’s superintendent, broke down the new program at the July 29 school board meeting. It will have an afternoon-to-evening time frame designed to allow work and study, or internship opportunities, along with job coaching during the earlier part of the day. In addition to courses needed for graduation, students will work toward earning a Regents diploma, and guidance and counseling will be integral to the program. Whether students participate will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, she said.
“This creates a program that we believe our students will benefit from in lieu of a more expensive option that is no longer meeting the needs of our students, enabling us to keep our students in-district in an effective program individualized to meet their needs,” Ms. Favre said in an email Tuesday. The district now has two or three students in the 10th, 11th, and 12th grades who are likely to take advantage of the program, she said.
Bob Hauser, the assistant superintendent for business, said the program would save at least $80,000 this year. Savings will accrue in the areas of tuition and transportation because existing staff will be the teachers and current bus routes will be used. Mr. Hauser said the program is being tested this summer with one student, a sophomore, who, he said, is showing “amazing progress.”
“The student has been coming here every day, gets the one-on-one attention with a teacher. There’s a job coach and another teacher for core classes. This is our trial to make sure it’s going to work,” he said.
Mr. Hauser noted that the program may also provide an option for other students to make up required physical education credits to be able to graduate.
On the phone yesterday, Ron White, president of the Bridgehampton School Board, called the program innovative, clever, and essential. “It’s giving a kid another option, another opportunity to be successful, because everyone doesn’t succeed in the same way.”