The Baxter County Alternative School was a concept originating from the need of the Baxter County Chancery Court, Juvenile Division, a.k.a. Baxter County Juvenile Services. The need for the Alternative School arose from youth already involved in the Juvenile Court System being suspended or expelled from school. The Juvenile Officer would require the youth to report to the juvenile office each day during this "out of school" time frame with a book and lunch. The juvenile then sat in the conference room from 8:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. or performed community service work. This provided accountability and supervision of the youth rather than being left to his/her own devices without adult supervision. Therefore, to meet the needs of the youth already involved in the system and to dissuade further involvement by these youth or others in delinquent behavior, this program was established. The program is not designed to compete or duplicate the services offered by the In-School (public school) Alternative Education Program, but to meet the needs that those programs cannot accommodate. Grant funding for this program was secured in 1995 and the program was implemented in 1996.

Today, the BCAS student enrollment is comprised of students referred from the public school in lieu of expulsion, students court-ordered to attend, students who require credit recovery courses, and students who are preparing for their General Education Diploma who were at risk of dropping out of the public schools for various reasons.

The first goal of the Baxter County Alternative School (BCAS) is to provide students suspended and/or expelled from school with a safe and secure learning environment. This goal is accomplished by employing adequate staff and routinely assessing academic progress of the student. The second goal is to provide greater parental involvement and accountability. This occurs by required attendance at parent empowerment classes and routine parent-teacher conferences. The third goal is to provide management of conflicts within the academic and social settings. This is achieved by providing students with opportunities for developing self discipline, anger control, and mediation skills.

The Baxter County Alternative School has a two-pronged approach:

    A.   behavior management, and
    B.   academic development.

The determination as to which tract the student will be placed is based upon the initial testing, the goals of the student, and the recommendation of the educational committee (which is comprised of the school principal, school counselor, program director, educational administrator and parent). BCAS staff conducts an initial interview with the parent and student to equip all parties with information on the problems and talents the individual student brings to the program.

The programmatics of BCAS are built upon three components:

Behavior management is essential to the success of the student. The programmatics are built around a level system of rewards and consequences. Every student begins at the same level and advances dependent upon responsible behavior. Additional privileges are granted at each level.

Academic Component - Each student is tested upon entering the program to determine his/her level of learning, then is prescribed the appropriate tract and assignments. The goal is for the student to grow in basic education knowledge and return to the age appropriate classroom setting, if possible.

Our curricula base includes:

• Portable Assisted Student Studies (PASS) curriculum
• GED curiculum
• Regular text books
• Aggression Replacement Training curriculum/Active Parenting Program
• PACE curriculum
• Life Skills training
• Career Orientation curriculum
• JEdI web-based study program

Vocational Component - Career Orientation is conducted within the GED prep program. Vocational tours are conducted to introduce students to the workplace environment and to give them an insight into job availability. Guest speakers present topics to motivate and inform students about the working world. In conjunction with the AmeriCorps Promise Fellow, the Alternative School participates in the National Groundhog Job Shadow Week in February. The students are matched with local business leaders to shadow for a day. The local Workforce Development Center, a division of the Employment Security Division, facilitates this component with instruction and assistance in job placement.

Counseling Component - Targets the learning and utilization of dispute resolution, conflict management, and anger control. Classroom and behavioral management are a priority in establishing an environment conductive to learning. The majority of the students have a deficit in their attention span due to drug and/or alcohol usage, lack of sleep, family conflict, or any number of reasons. A licensed counselor is on staff for BCAS students. This counselor is housed on site and is available three days a week for crisis management and individual counseling. In addition, Child & Youth Pediatric Clinic provides counselors and case managers on a daily basis. Case managers from local mental health agencies provide services to youth already involved with their agency. Also behavioral health systems representing treatment facilities provide staff persons for emergency assessments.

The Aggression Replacement Training curriculum, a behavioral rehearsal approach to violence prevention, is taught by all the BCAS instructors twice a day to allow the subject matter to be continuously imparted to the students and parents. In addition, the Active Parenting curriculum provides evening Family Dynamics, which are mandatory for BCAS students and their parents, but are open to the general public as well. This program is coeducational for the parent's and student's participation in a once-weekly, eight class series. With the continuous instruction of this material, it is hoped the skills will actually take hold in their lifestyles, breaking the cycle of violence and lead to a peace filled life, producing productive citizens.

Volunteer assistance is essential to the success of the students. Volunteers make up our T.I.M.E. mentoring program, tutoring program, and community partnership/community service program.

Through a contractual agreement with the area public schools, BCAS receives a per student tuition from the referring school. The area superintendents helped orchestrate and promote this financial arrangement in order to offer fiscal security to sustain the program because of the need for the program and the excellent outcomes the program produces.

In September 2003, the Baxter County alternative School was awarded the prestigious "Juvenile Justice Program of the Year" award for the State of Arkansas from the Arkansas Coalition for Juvenile Justice.

If you are interested in volunteering, contact Baxter County Juvenile Services at 425-3840 or fill out a volunteer application here.