Rushmore students get new classrooms, training choices

MARION – Steve Vanderhoff scampered onto bus number 26 and welcomed students arriving at the new Rushmore Academy during the first day of classes Wednesday.

Students were arriving for the second daily session as other students were departing from morning classes. It’s a chaotic scene typical of a first day of school anywhere, with kids asking for directions, filling out paperwork and trying to get past new computer passwords to log into class assignments.

The difference this year for 264 Rushmore students enrolled for fall quarter is that the classrooms are brand new, and on the other side of town from the school’s old location at the former Colonial Acres Elementary School on Marion’s west side.

A wave of students arrived dressed for the 90-degree summer heat and still talking in their outside voices. They passed beneath a sign hanging from new ceiling tiles proclaiming “Hope Is Taught Here.”

A new kind of alternative school

The Rushmore Academy is now a school-within-a-school, with new classroom space constructed this summer inside the Tri-Rivers Career Center on Ohio 95, along Marion’s education corridor that includes Marion Technical College and The Ohio State University at Marion campus.

Creating an alternative high school learning environment for dropout recovery students within a vocational school setting is a first in Ohio.

Vanderhoff, the school’s director, introduced himself and his entire staff during an assembly in the school’s cafeteria. About 20 freshmen mixed with many returning students, including seniors Heather Cochran and Jessica Adamson, who have been Rushmore students since eighth grade.

“Welcome to the brand new Rushmore Academy,” Vanderhoff boomed through a public address system.

“The only reason we moved here is for the career technical opportunities for you,” he said. “Please be patient with us, this is brand new to us, and we’ve got a brand new staff. You’ll not only have the chance to earn a high school diploma here, you can earn a diploma-plus. All we are asking is for you to bring your game face a few hours every day.”

The diploma-plus concept mirrors Marion City Schools’ efforts to provide career training for entry-level jobs for all graduating high school students.

Rushmore students will attend classes separate from the Tri-Rivers kids, but the Rushmore students will benefit from job training provided by Tri-Rivers instructors in a collaborative effort to provide all Marion City Schools students an opportunity to earn a traditional high school diploma along with some type of job training certification.

Rushmore students will receive two hours of academic instruction for every hour of job training in areas like building maintenance, manufacturing, automotive, construction services, health care and food services skills and employability. The Tri-Rivers staff developed the technical curriculum with input from area businesses with the goal of awarding certifications recognized in their respective industries, according to Vanderhoff.

The students can also earn the opportunity to be accepted directly into Tri-Rivers as regular students and choose from 13 career programs, including welding, cosmetology, industrial power technology, digital media and industrial robotics.

“There are about 2,200 unfilled jobs out there,” Vanderhoff told the assembled students. “We will do anything we can do to get you an above a minimum wage job.”

Improved facilities

Rushmore Academy started in 2009 for 53 at-risk students who left traditional education because of pregnancies, behavior problems, education credit deficits or homelessness. Some have served time in juvenile detention or substance abuse rehabilitation facilities. All of them want another chance at a high school diploma.

The school’s flexible schedules and online classes help students juggle job and parenting responsibilities with classwork. The academy has helped 475 students earn diplomas since 2009. Many of the students come from homes where parents or guardians hadn’t graduated from high school.

The school runs with a combination of flexibility and structure; tough love is delivered by a staff that constantly monitors their students with personal calls, home visits and assistance finding housing and jobs.

Vanderhoff hopes the modern classrooms, dedicated kitchen and an on-site child watch room will be a more inviting learning environment for his students, who don’t always succeed during their first attempt to return to school. The addition of a lounge exclusively for seniors called “Rushmore Road” is another perk designed to reward advancement, which Vanderhoff hopes will motivate the underclassmen.

Tri-Rivers will get $8,333 per month to lease the 30,000 square feet of renovated classroom space from Marion City Schools, the main sponsor of Rushmore, and additional career technical funding provide by the state on a per-pupil rate.

“We hosted an open house last Monday for the students and families, and the turn out was amazing,” Vanderhoff said. “We had over 500 tour the classrooms, and there was a lot of excitement.”

Graduates with job-ready skills

Rushmore has built working relationships with several employers in the area to place students in entry-level jobs. The move to Tri-Rivers and the addition of career training is another step toward producing graduates with job-ready work skills. The ultimate goal is to both help students move into the workplace, and to strengthen the community by producing an employable workforce, according to Marion City Schools Superintendent Gary Barber.

“We want to graduate students that are prepared for acceptance,” Barber said.

“Acceptance into a high demand job, the military, adult education, like a two- or four-year college program, or an apprenticeship program,” he said. “We really want to filter our kids into career pathways that will benefit the community. There are 10,000 jobs within a 20-mile radius of Marion that don’t necessarily require a bachelor degree, so we are designing programs to meet the those opportunities.”

Barber said meetings with area employers, including Whirlpool Corp., Nucor Steel and Marion Intermodal helped administrators design the career training instruction curriculum that Rushmore students will begin in August.

A catalyst for change

Seniors Jessica Adamson and Heather Cochran have been Rushmore students since dropping out of Grant Middle School in the eighth grade. They are looking forward to their senior year in the new facility.

“I can really say that Rushmore changed my life,” Adamson said. “I’m sure I’d be locked up or dead if I wasn’t here.”

“I was always down for ‘habitual disobedience,’” she said. “I got myself in bad situations and fell under bad influences. But they’ve been very positive here. They come to your house. They push you to succeed. It’s not easy; you still have work. You really have to want it.”

Adamson will participate in the food service training at Rushmore, but only to help her work her way through college. She’d like to be a social worker. Cochran has a baby at home, so she needs a flexible schedule and online courses to remain on track to graduate. She’d like to be a nursing assistant one-day.

“I learned you can do anything you want with your life, you’ve just got to set goals,” said Cochran.

“No one is going to change you. You have to want to change yourself.”

Students like Adamson and Cochran credit the staff’s persistence and personal attention for getting them to their senior year. It’s all part of the job for the 26 teachers at Rushmore working with non-traditional students and employing non-traditional strategies to engage and encourage the students.

After the second session assembly, Vanderhoff is on his cellphone talking to a 21-year-old student who enrolled for fall quarter, only to leave the building on the first day of class, frustrated that his name didn’t appear on the fall roster. Vanderhoff convinces him to return the next day to resolve the mix-up, and reminded him that he needed a high school diploma to make it in this world.

“Maybe he had doubts about returning to high school at his age,” he speculated after the call. “If he doesn’t come back, we’ll go get him.”

“What can you do?” Vanderhoff said. “We try and help them face their problems head-on. We provide the services and the support to make school possible. I know change is tough on these kids. But this facility is dedicated to them. We try and build confidence and self-esteem in our students. I really think this building reflects that.”

“We just decided ‘Hey, if we build it, they will come.’”

jsmiller@gannett.com

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