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Charter School Application Started After Stallworth “Stepped Forward”
August 11, 2008
The charter application that has been filed for the Charter Magnet School at Century began when local Baptist minister Irvin Stallworth stepped forward to help save the town’s school, according to the charter application.
The application’s narrative reads, in part:
“With govermental financial pressures mounting, a rumor spread rapidly that the administration of the county school district was to propose the closure and consolidation of the K-8 school.
“Like a lightning bolt the prospect of closure galvanized the community behind the school, and a local Baptist minister stepped forward at the request of the town’s Mayor Freddie McCall to help the town keep a school.
“Several years earlier, the Baptist minister has seen a need in the community. He founded a church in Century, and then in the aftermath of a major hurricane, formed a Public-Private-Faith based nonprofit to help the community find its vision and purpose. The nonprofit was called the Century Community Development Partnership, Inc.
“Century Community Development Partnership, Inc. was founded by Rev. Irvin Stallworth in 2005 in response to a need for critical community infrastructure, especially affordable housing…especially affordable housing in the catastrophic wake of Hurricane Ivan and many long years of poverty in the community.
“The need for other elements of community infrastructure quickly became apparent, such as daycare, urgent medical care, local public transportation, communications and improved schools. Working closely with the mayor and town council, Rev. Stallworth helped organize a “Blue Ribbon Committee” to make sure the Town of Century would have a school. The Mayor and Town Council named Rev. Stallworth as chairman of the committee.”
The narrative ends with:
“At the request of Rev. Stallworth a new nonprofit corporation will be filed to hold the charter of the Charter Magnet School at Century. The corporation is being named the “The Charter Magnet School at Century.”
Stallworth is pastor of New Life Baptist Church in Century.
The Town of Century’s Blue Ribbon Committee referenced above in the charter application is not the same as the Century Blue Ribbon Committee on Education that prepared the charter application, according to Century Mayor Freddie McCall and other members of the town’s Blue Ribbon Committee. For more information on that story, click here.
Comments
2 Responses to “Charter School Application Started After Stallworth “Stepped Forward””
Ok Jack then stop doing your best to block industry when it tries to come here. It seems that if you can’t get a cut of the action, financial or status, you do everything you can to ruin a deal with the town. Shame on you for blocking potential industry moving here and then saying how important it is to get industry here. You cannot have it both ways.
Century has many problems but mostly based on the large percentage of second and third generation welfare recepients. That is no secret. Century has to stop viewing itself as a “grant hole” based on poverty. That does nothing more than breed the generational feeling of being poor and receiving handouts. Jack you are on that same bandwagon, you want to make your money and notoriety for bringing relief to the poor and downtrodden of Century by getting grant after grant. You and Mr. Barnes, the man you so complain about, are very similar both of you have spent your time and energy trying to get grant after grant but really have nothing concrete to show for those efforts.
How about thinking of Century as a town of achievers, therefore the residents will begin to see themselves as successful and not just a town full of the poor and downtrodden?
Several years ago, as a business consultant, I had the job of helping a fairly large company relocate its operations. The owner and chairman of the board outlined about 12 potential new sites for the company’s relocation. It was a manufacturing business. I analyzed the various pluses and minuses of each location with regard to supply-chain and finished product distribution costs and other factors. That reduced the number of potential new locations by half.
Several of the executives, key-management employees would be asked to relocate with the company, but most of the daily production workers would be new-hires from the area of the new location. The next step in selecting the final location was to engage the spouses of these key employees. We ask the wives of the key-management executives to make a list of the elements of Life Qualities they desired to find in a new community. Their lists were not surprising, but very different from the men.
The wives and mothers wanted to know about things that contributed to and stimulated the lives and future of their children. They wanted to know about the availability of ballet and dance classes; tumbling and gymnastics classes; karate classes, piano lessons, horseback riding lessons, voice lessons, and recreation centers like the YWCA or Boy’s Club. They also wanted to know about churches, libraries, hospitals, the performing arts theaters, adult and children’s chorus and festivals. They wanted to know about the house they might buy, or at least the neighborhood where they might build a new house; they wanted to know how safe the neighborhoods were.
I think it is obvious but I will say it anyway; these lists narrowed the short list of acceptable locations drastically! The final location selected offered the most community involvement in creating a quality of life, especially for the children.
If Century wants jobs, the community has to focus on developing the elements of Life Quality for the Children! Playgrounds, school crossings, after school activities – and all of the things on mother’s lists.
“Build It and They Will Come” is not just a line from a movie called Field of Dreams.
Jack Moran
Bratt/Byrneville