GLOW Academy to expand with early childhood education centers across Wilmington

A local charter school will soon open several early childhood education centers in an effort to close New Hanover County’s opportunity and achievement gaps.

Beacon Education, the nonprofit that supports GLOW Academy, announced plans to begin working on four or five co-educational, mixed-income early childhood centers that will provide high-quality educational programs to children from six weeks old to pre-K.

“Together with GLOW faculty and community leaders, it became clear that we need to start earlier to address the inequities in education that cause the opportunity and achievement gaps,” said Beacon Education CEO Todd Godbey.

Beacon Education recently changed its name from GLOW NC, and focuses on achievements it has seen through GLOW Academy, as well as other data collected over the past seven years, to identify where achievement gaps exist in New Hanover County.

Its researchers found that sixth graders attending GLOW Academy typically begin the year more than three years behind grade level. On average, Black students in New Hanover County are around three grade levels behind their white peers.

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The new early childhood programs are aimed to combat this and promote the organization’s “cradle-to-career education equity program.” The facilities will accommodate around 150 students and provide sliding scale scholarships to families in need while also drawing in wealthier families with high-quality programming.

The facilities will open throughout Wilmington based on access and appeal, according to a news release, with the first center set to open in July 2023.

The location of that center will be announced later this summer. The facilities will also feature a health care clinic on-site, and farmers markets will be offered on weekends.

Girls Leadership Academy of Wilmington, or GLOW Academy, opened in 2016 with its first class of sixth graders, and will celebrate its inaugural graduating class in 2023. It is one of 21 “groundbreaking single-gender schools across the country” to support girls from predominantly underserved communities in their education. Many will go on to be the first in their families to attend college.

Over the next four years, Beacon Education also plans to open a co-educational elementary school based on its already-existing programs at GLOW Academy. The elementary school will include "trauma-informed systems” and a health care clinic on-site.

It also plans to open an all-boys middle and high school similar to GLOW Academy that will focus on college and career readiness for boys in underserved communities, and it will add a community healthcare clinic to GLOW, staffed weekly by a physician’s assistant and a full-time mental health professional.

Reporter Sydney Hoover can be reached at 910-343-2339 or shoover@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: GLOW Academy to expand services in effort to close achievement gap