Highland County Alternative School to close

The Highland County Alternative School will be closed at the end of the school year as a cost-savings measure for the three school districts that currently support its services. However, according to Hillsboro Superintendent Rick Earley, internal programming will be available for the students who need alternative education. 

"Internally, we will have our own alternative school," Earley said. "The Highland County Alternative School will not exist due to budget constraints and efforts by all the districts to save money."

The alternative school is currently being operated out of buildings located at the site of the old Hillsboro High School. In the 2010/2011 school year, Earley said, only Hillsboro, Lynchburg-Clay Local School District, and the Greenfield Exempted Village Schools had students in the programming. 

"(Hillsboro) is the financial agent," Earley said. "In a joint agreement with the three districts needing to do cutbacks in expenditures, we decided we needed to do things a little differently."

Earley said that the function of the alternative school is to provide programming for students who need an academic setting outside of the traditional scope.

"Sometimes just a regular education does not fit the needs of everyone, so we try to adjust accordingly," Earley said. "There are various reasons why (a student would need alternative education). Sometimes it's behavior, sometimes it's major learning issues, sometimes they are at-risk or have credit deficiencies, and that is why we end up putting them in that setting. We're still going to be doing alternative education for some of the kids, but it is an on as-needed basis, and it will be embedded in our buildings."

Most of the funding for the school came through grants, Earley said. 

"Shane Shope (L-C superintendent), Terry Fouch (Greenfield superintendent), Tony Long (superintendent of the Southern Ohio Educational Service Center) and I all decided we had to do something a little differently due to finances."

There are currently five to six people employed with the alternative school and Earley said that "a little bit of displacement for two to three people" could result from the changes.