Clarksville Redevelopment Commission awards $400,000 to local schools

Brooke McAfee, The Evening News and the Tribune, Jeffersonville, Ind.
·3 min read

Mar. 30—CLARKSVILLE — The Clarksville Redevelopment Commission is supporting workforce education programs at local schools.

On Tuesday, the commission voted to approve $400,000 in funding for schools and school districts serving Clarksville students for 2023. The Workforce Ready Fund, created last year by the commission, is investing annually in local schools.

The fund aims to support the town's future workforce by investing in students at an early level. The funding allocations were determined based on the number of enrolled students at each school/district living in Clarksville's 47129 ZIP code.

Clarksville Community Schools is receiving the highest amount at $234,857. Greater Clark County Schools is receiving $132,803, which will support Parkwood Elementary in Clarksville.

Several private schools are also receiving funding. St. Anthony of Padua School is receiving $25,182, and Our Lady of Providence High School is receiving $7,157.

Since 2015, the Clarksville Redevelopment Commission has given a portion of tax increment financing (TIF) dollars to local schools. The Workforce Ready Fund has been approved through 2024, and it might be extended.

Previously, the commission used TIF dollars to support Clarksville Community Schools and Greater Clark, but a new formula based on ZIP code has expanded funding to include the two private schools.

Clarksville Redevelopment Commission President Mike Mustain said by giving students an early start in workforce training and education, the funding "gets them a head start in the real world when they're actually going out into the marketplace and working."

"Sometimes these students are best suited for labor-type jobs, sometimes they're best suited for white-collar or blue-collar jobs," Mustain said. "But getting them started and giving them that early education is key to workforce development."

Clarksville Community Schools Superintendent Tina Bennett said that in the upcoming school year, the district will use the funds to support STEM labs and STEM programming at the elementary and middle school level.

The school has also used the funds from the Clarksville Redevelopment Commission to support college/career readiness classes and dual credit courses at the high school level.

"We offer the opportunity for them to get an associate's degree, and we are utilizing funding to pay for Ivy Tech courses and/or [Indiana University Southeast] dual credit courses," Bennett said. "We are also using some of the funding — and have used some of the funding in the past — for devices for our students."

Bennett said the funding has been "instrumental" in the district being able to buy insurance for Chromebooks or laptops at the high school level.

"We appreciate the support from our town," Bennett said. "We feel like we have an excellent partnership with the town in many, many different facets of programming for Clarksville Community Schools, and this is just another one of those wonderful opportunities for Clarksville."

The program allows Clarksville Community Schools to offer opportunities for students with the hopes that "they will be able to give back to their community as they graduate," she said.

"The workforce and workforce development have changed dramatically over the past 10 years," Bennett said. "So what we need to do to prepare students to be successful after they graduate high school, also much changed with that, and I think having the funds there to support STEM activities and college/career preparedness activities and coursework is paramount to preparing our students to be productive citizens."

Mustain said the commission wants to see the funding support local students in the "best possible way that the school sees fit."

"They know their students, they know their school, they know what needs they have better than we do as a redevelopment commission, and that's the reason we've kind of liberalized the requirements on this," he said. "They can use this to best benefit, however that may appear in their school."

"As far as the redevelopment commission, we're happy to be able to do this, and as continued growth in Clarksville happens, we look to be able to do more in the future even to the point of, if possible, increasing that assistance amount."