Dear Fellow Chamber of Commerce Member, As a citizen of the Dougherty County area and businessperson, you know that one of the key components of your future success is the economic viability of the region, which in turn heavily depends on the quality of our workforce. Every business owner in Dougherty County has faced serious challenges in finding and keeping qualified employees. We believe that Albany needs a “shot in the arm” to improve the talent pool in our area.

We’ve founded the Collegiate Academy of Albany (“CAA”) to provide all Albany’s families, without regard to their economic situation and to provide greater opportunities for their children to receive a high-quality, college-prep education. We have applied for a charter from the Georgia Charter Schools Commission; If granted, we will open as a K-3 school in August 2020, growing a grade a year until we’re hopefully educating 1,430 students in grades K-12. There will be no tuition or admission tests as the school will be a public charter school with a statewide attendance zone, funded completely by the state.

We believe that every family, regardless of net worth and income level, deserves the best education possible. As business people, we need our graduates to be ready for college and the workforce, in the hopes that they will remain in our community to make it stronger and more viable.

Please share the attached link with your employees and ask them to spread the word. We need a strong show of support for our school in the community and need your help to make it happen. Please ask every employee to go online to https://caalbany.sabis.net/sign-our-petition and sign this petition so we may be granted our charter. We would also appreciate you writing a letter of support. Please send the letter to delk.glenn@gmail.com. Also, if you have any questions or wish us to attend an employee meeting to answer any questions, please let us know at delk.glenn@gmail.com and we will be in touch shortly.

Our community has so much to gain with the success of this school. Please join us in giving our kids greater opportunities to a high quality, public education.

Collegiate Academy of Albany[1]

ATLANTA (Feb. 26, 2019) – New Schools Georgia, Inc, (NSG), has filed a petition with the Georgia Charter Schools Commission, seeking authority to open an independent charter school to serve families in Albany and the surrounding area.

NSG is a statewide organization established by Allen Hughes, of Walton Press in Monroe, Ga., and Glenn Delk, an Atlanta attorney, to assist local communities in attracting high-quality school operators with proven track records, academically and financially, to open charter schools throughout Georgia.

NSG has begun the process of developing a board of directors for both the Collegiate Academy of Albany (CAA) as well as the statewide organization. To date, Glenn Singfield, the owner of Albany Fish Company and Artesian Contracting Co., and Stan Logue, the chief financial officer of Thrush Aircraft, have agreed to serve on the local board. Wendell Christian, a retired superintendent, Robert Thorpe, a retired high school principal, and Heather Robertson, an educational consultant, have joined the NSG board.

If approved by the Commission, CAA would open in August 2020, serving up to 376 students in Albany/Dougherty County in grades K-3, on a first-come, first-serve basis, with no admissions testing, growing a grade a year until the school hits a capacity of 1,450 students in grades K-12. If demand exceeds supply, enrollment at the tuition-free, public charter school would be through a lottery system

Charter schools are tuition-free, public schools.

Allen and Teresa Hughes, whose Hughes Family Foundation is leading the effort, lived in Albany until 1987 and returned to help out after recent tornadoes and Hurricane Michael damaged the area.

Allen Hughes said he wanted to help the community because he was inspired by his wife’s faith to give back to their hometown.

“We want to offer Albany-area families the same access to quality educational opportunities as other students have across our state,” Allen Hughes said. “CAA will offer Albany’s children the opportunity to receive a world-class education and prepare them to compete and succeed in the 21^stCentury economy.”

The creation of CAA will also benefit the Dougherty school district since it will be solely funded by the state and not utilize local tax dollars. For each student who shifts from the district to the charter school, the district will retain the local per pupil expenditure — $4,100 per student, Delk said.

“CAA will not only offer access to a world-class education for students who choose to attend but will also free up to $1.5 million the first year the charter opens so that the district will eventually have an extra $5.5 million annually,” Delk said.

The CAA board has chosen SABIS Educational Systems, Inc, a 133-year-old company educating 70,000 students in 20 countries on five continents to manage the new charter in Albany. http://www.sabis.net.

Chosen for their record of academic achievement and fiscal soundness, SABIS offers an integrated, comprehensive K-12 program which uses dynamic materials, proven methods and cutting-edge technology to deliver superior results such as closing the achievement gap with low-income, minority students in the U.S., as evidenced by the 22-year record of SABIS Springfield, Mass., where Hispanic and African-American students outperform the state average for white students on math and English exams.

“Together with the Hughes Foundation, we plan to deliver quality educational opportunities to Dougherty County’s families,” said Jose Afonso, SABIS’ director of development in the United States. “They will soon join the nearly 1,900 graduates from our class of 2018, in being accepted to over 500 colleges and universities throughout the world. These proud graduates are attending great U.S. universities, such as Georgia Tech, Kennesaw State, SCAD, Harvard and MIT, to name a few.”

For More Information Contact: Glenn Delk, delk.glenn@gmail.com, or visit the website: https://caalbany.sabis.net/#Locator

Read more about it in the Albany Herald:

https://www.albanyherald.com/news/local/former-albany-residents-file-charter-school-petition/article_4f5549c9-6180-516f-8f05-2104429432de.html

Visit us today and discover all the ways STAPLES can help your business grow.

502 N. Slappey Blvd. Albay GA 31701 229.639.1887

Dear Business Owner/Manager/Community Leader:

Keep Albany-Dougherty Beautiful (KADB) is coordinating a 2019 office recycling program for the Albany-Dougherty business community. Recycling in the workplace is a responsibility that each of us needs to accept, and we are asking you to set the example for our community by participating in this project.

If your office would like to be a recycling pacesetter, just fill out the attached e-form on the link below and submit it back to KADB. If your office needs assistance with the “how to’s” check the appropriate box on the form and we will set up a training session at your office.

By Joining the 2019initiative, you will be publicly acknowledged in The Albany Herald, you will be offered free desk recycling containers for each desk in your office and you will receive a Recycling Salute magnetic decal to place on your front door. Your participation in this environmental project says to your employees, clients, and customers that you are committed to improving the environment in OUR community.

Sincerely,

Executive Director

Sign up today!

https://eforms.albanyga.gov/f/officerecycle

Join us for the 2019 Southwest Georgia Home, Garden & Outdoor Expo presented by Home Depot and hosted by the Albany Herald Saturday, March 23 at the Albany Civic Center from 10am-5pm. Explore new trends in home, garden and outdoor fun with professionals standing by to help you with home repair, remodeling, & building, DIY, landscaping & gardening, hunting, fishing, camping, boating and much more!

Turner Job Corps Center, Students, Staff, Supporters Celebrate 8^th Annual National Job Corps Commencement Day

Wednesday February 6, 2019

For Immediate Release

Turner Job Corps Center joined 125 Job Corps centers across the country to celebrate the 8^th Annual “National Job Corps Commencement Day” ceremony Friday February 8, 2019 at 1pm to congratulate the Job Corps students who showed Job Corps Works! by completing the program this year.

Recent Job Corps graduates employed in Georgia, employer partners, local policymakers, community leaders, family members and many others recognized these students’ achievements and the investment they made in their futures and community.

“Our people are our future and our passion resource,” said Kenneth Cutts, Sanford Bishop Congressional District Director, the keynote speaker at Turner Job Corps Center’s ceremony.

Turner Job Corps Center is one of 125 Job Corps centers located across the country. A unique national program, Job Corps offers underserved youth a set of diverse academic opportunities and career pathways tailored to meet the needs of business and industry. Each year, Job Corps gives tens of thousands of youth a second chance to complete their education and advance into careers, higher education or the military.

Job Corps has served more than 3 million out-of-work young adults and underserved youth nationally. Many are high-school dropouts or public-assistance recipients, and Job Corps helps them become active contributors to their communities.

“Remember the road traveled and step into your glory!” said William Coleman, the center’s director.

Local business leaders attended the ceremony at Turner Job Corps Center to support a program that benefits the local economy. The average Job Corps center supports 228 local jobs, and every dollar invested in Job Corps returns almost $2 to the local economy. Nationally, the 125 Job Corps centers support about 30,000 jobs, the vast majority of which are with private businesses.

Local community members who have worked with Job Corps volunteers also joined the celebration to congratulate many of their student volunteers. Job Corps students and staff work with local community-based organizations and nonprofits, logging many hours of volunteer service every year. For example, Turner Job Corps Center students collaborate with Open Arms Inc, Albany Housing Authority, The City of Albany, Boys & Girl Club of America, and Albany Technical College to provide needed services to Dougherty County Community.

“The 8th Annual National Job Corps Commencement Day is a very special day for our program,” said National Job Corps Association Executive Director Greg Roberts. “The Job Corps community – our students, their families, center staff, operators, community leaders, employer partners and supporters – worked hard to transform futures that will lead to a lifetime of preparation and success.  The devotion of our community is why Job Corps has such strong bipartisan support in Congress and why it continues to be the most successful job training program for America’s underserved youth.”

Contact:

Melvin Drake, 229-319-3436, drake.melvin@jobcorps.org

Brendan O’Hara, National Job Corps Association, bohara@njcaweb.org