Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, June 12, 1993                   TAG: 9306140347
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SOME BASICS ABOUT ALTERNATIVE ED

Open year-round. Hours during the academic year: 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.

The program started in 1986 with seven staff members, 20 students, and a budget of $160,000.

Now there are 28 staffers, nearly 300 students, and a budget of $728,000.

277 students were sent there this year - 209 by Roanoke's two high schools and 68 by the six middle schools.

106 students were in Alternative Ed's night school, the Drop-In Academy, mostly for older working students working on high school diplomas.

Typical reasons for sending them to Alternative Ed: Classroom disruptions, criminal activity, fighting, severe truancy or social problems.

It's a program, not a school, so seniors get diplomas from their home schools, not from Alternative Ed.

Among the programs administered at the Alternative Education Center:

\ Classes under the Job Training Partnership Act: Skills-building, job placement.

\ WAVE: A national self-esteem leadership program whose acronym stands for "Work, Achievement, Values and Education." It helps students find jobs, work on self-respect and resolve conflicts at home.

\ Boot Camp: Drills, homework, special speakers and athletics, all aimed at self-respect and self-discipline.

\ Drop-In Academy: night school, from late afternoon to 9 p.m., for older and working students.

\ Summer School, called School Without Walls.

"Off-site" tutoring for students with weapons offenses who are not allowed into the Alternative Ed building.

\ Field trips: Students this year have gone to Washington, three college campuses, Mountain Lake, camps, parks, Kings Dominion. They sometimes go to plays, restaurants, the Roanoke Symphony and to area prisons.