Alternative Education
Welcome
This combination of court and community schools provides options that
improve student safety, encourage learning, reduce classroom disruption
and significantly reduce Kern County's dropout rate. Operated
year-round, these programs provide education at 14 county locations to
approximately 8,000 students each year who are at-risk of failing.
Court school instruction has been provided by
the Kern County Superintendent of Schools since 1972 for students
incarcerated in juvenile detention facilities. In addition, the
non-residential Court School program has been established in
Bakersfield and Ridgecrest whereby juvenile offenders are ordered by a
judge to attend school but are not held in the juvenile facility. Kern
County Superintendent of Schools also operates residential educational
programs for children in the Jamison Children's Center.
Community
schools have been operated by the Kern County Superintendent of Schools
since 1987 and serve at-risk students who have been expelled, on
probation or who are not attending school for other reasons. Working
with Kern County school districts, community schools have helped
decrease the dropout rate in Kern County more than 50 percent since its
inception.
Community schools now serve Bakersfield, Delano, Lake
Isabella, Mojave, Ridgecrest and Taft. Some programs are highly
structured and offer vocational training. Others require eight hour
school days. Due to distance factors, yet another alternative is
independent study as a short-term solution.
This is a Manila site.