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Deaf pupils in danger of losing their school - Las Vegas Sun
The organizers of the Las Vegas Charter School for the Deaf spent more than six years raising enough money to lease a facility, finally opening the school in fall 2008.
Now the program’s future is at risk because the building it shares is up for sale.
The owner of Creative Kids Learning Center, at North Tenaya Way and Westcliff Drive, has offered to sell the 7,300 square-foot building for $1 million (20 percent down). But that’s far beyond the means of the modest charter school, which recently finished its first year of operation with three students and expects an enrollment of seven in the fall.
“We’ve had a lot of people offer suggestions and advice,” said Caroline Bass, who serves as secretary of the charter school’s board and is lead instructor of the interpreter preparation and deaf studies program at the College of Southern Nevada. “What we don’t have yet is someone willing to step in, buy the building as an investment and lease it back to us.”
Public schools are required by law to provide services for all children with disabilities. Some of Clark County’s deaf and partially deaf students are in mainstream classrooms with interpreters, and others are grouped together at certain campuses.
The charter school offers “bilingual-bicultural education,” a model followed by many of the nation’s top schools for the deaf. Teachers are fluent in American Sign Language, and students also learn to read and write in English.
More information is available at lvcsd.org.
The organizers of the Las Vegas Charter School for the Deaf spent more than six years raising enough money to lease a facility, finally opening the school in fall 2008.
Now the program’s future is at risk because the building it shares is up for sale.
The owner of Creative Kids Learning Center, at North Tenaya Way and Westcliff Drive, has offered to sell the 7,300 square-foot building for $1 million (20 percent down). But that’s far beyond the means of the modest charter school, which recently finished its first year of operation with three students and expects an enrollment of seven in the fall.
“We’ve had a lot of people offer suggestions and advice,” said Caroline Bass, who serves as secretary of the charter school’s board and is lead instructor of the interpreter preparation and deaf studies program at the College of Southern Nevada. “What we don’t have yet is someone willing to step in, buy the building as an investment and lease it back to us.”
Public schools are required by law to provide services for all children with disabilities. Some of Clark County’s deaf and partially deaf students are in mainstream classrooms with interpreters, and others are grouped together at certain campuses.
The charter school offers “bilingual-bicultural education,” a model followed by many of the nation’s top schools for the deaf. Teachers are fluent in American Sign Language, and students also learn to read and write in English.
More information is available at lvcsd.org.