FRANKLIN
J.P. King Jr. Middle School has been granted full accreditation by the Virginia Department of Education for the 2017-2018 school year, having undergone the process of reconstitution during the previous school year. Charles Pyle, director of communications for VDOE, announced J.P. King’s new status via a department press release on Wednesday morning, alongside 28 other schools in Virginia that also will be accredited this year via reconstitution.

Pyle explained that reconstitution involves significant changes in school leadership, governance, faculty or instruction. Reconstitution plans must be approved by the state Board of Education.

“Teamwork is a huge part of our success,” said J.P. King Principal Lisa Francis, reacting to the news of her school’s accreditation. “We knew what needed to be done and through passion, resilience, determination and focus we as a team, students, teachers, parents and the community, reached our desired goal. We are already moving forward preparing for this school year to take those goals even higher.

“We will increase the rigor in the classroom and continue to build those positive relationships with all stakeholders. Our team is amazing and we cannot thank everyone enough who has supported us through this journey. We are excited to begin our next chapter at JPK.”

This makes two out of the three Franklin city public schools fully accredited for the current school year. Franklin High School remains fully accredited through the 2019-2020 school year under VDOE’s three-year accreditation policy, where if a school has met or exceeded benchmarks for the past three years, it is accredited for another three regardless of current SOL scores.

S.P. Morton Elementary School, the third school in the FCPS division, however, remains unaccredited. According to Pyle’s release, this decision was made by the VDOE on the grounds that the school has shown persistently low student achievement. The release also indicates that all public schools in Isle of Wight and Southampton counties have received full accreditation for the 2017-2018 school year.