By JIM FAILE

Darlington County School District officials, together with officials from Sonoco, Coker College and the S.C. Governor’s School for Science and Mathematics unveiled a new public-private partnership unlike any other in South Carolina to implement a comprehensive scholastic excellence program in Hartsville’s public schools next fall.

P.U.L.S.E. – Partners for Unparalleled Local Scholastic Excellence – will expand curriculum opportunities in Hartsville’s schools and improve student achievement through collaborative academic and social development initiatives, Superintendent of Education Dr. Raniey Knight said.

Sonoco is funding the project with a $5 million grant over a five-year period.

“Together, Darlington County School District, Coker College, the Governor’s School for Science and Mathematics with the financial support of Sonoco, will create a framework of educational excellence in Hartsville,” Knight said.

“Together, we are pushing our boundaries and our expectations for our children and ourselves – because that’s what it takes to be competitive not only in South Carolina, but in the nation and the world.”

The program will focus on overall child development at the elementary grade level and on offering expanded learning opportunities for secondary and high school students.

“I truly believe that this initiative, when implemented this fall, will put Hartsville on the map when it comes to education excellence,” said Sonoco Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Harris E. DeLoach Jr.

Knight agreed. “Through the opportunities and promise of the P.U.L.S.E. program, Darlington County School District can and will become one of the fastest improving school districts in the state,” she said. “We can and will close the achievement gap and be counted among the very best school districts our state has to offer.”

Knight said P.U.L.S.E. will help drive the district toward its goal of being among the top 25 percent of South Carolina school districts within the next five years and among the top 25 percent in the nation within a decade.

A key component of the P.U.L.S.E. initiative will be the implementation of a pilot School Development Program (SDP) at four Hartsville elementary schools that is focused not only on improving academic achievement but also on the overall personal development of children.

The program will be created with help from Yale University’s Child Study Center Comer School Development Program, founded in 1968 by Dr. James P. Comer, Maurice Falk Professor of Child Psychiatry and associate dean of the Yale School of Medicine.

The nationally recognized Comer SDP model has been successfully implemented in hundreds of schools in more than 20 states, the District of Columbia, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, England and Ireland.

The pilot program will begin in the 2011 – 2012 school year in Thornwell School for the Arts, Washington Street Elementary School, West Hartsville Elementary School and the Southside Early Childhood Center.

State Superintendent of Education Mick Zais welcomed that approach. “While every child is special, every child is different,” Zais said. He said Hartsville is fortunate to have a company like Sonoco to make the initiative possible.

In future years, professional development programs for educators and multiple service-learning activities offered at Coker College via the growing Yale-Coker partnership will play a vital role in the continuing improvement process, said Coker College President Dr. Robert Wyatt. Wyatt said the Yale-Coker partnership represents a commitment by both institutions to strengthen Coker’s teacher education program and to provide more professional development opportunities for local teachers.

A second component will focus on expanding scholastic learning opportunities and curriculum offerings for eligible students in Hartsville’s secondary and high schools through collaborative teaching programs from the Governor’s School and Coker College.

“Through this collaborative agreement, our students will be able to now take classes at Coker College or the Governor’s School to compliment their core courses at Hartsville High,” Knight said. “They will be able to take advantage of Coker’s exceptional fine arts programs and enhanced curriculum for the Governor’s School in classes such as organic chemistry and Mandarin Chinese.”

“We have exceptional music teachers who run award-winning band, vocal and strings programs, but we did not have a fine arts program at our high school – until today,” Knight said. “Hartsville High offers IB courses, advanced placement courses and honors courses in many subjects, but we lack the resources to offer specific upper-level courses such as organic chemistry – until today.”

Coker College, recognized as a leading liberal arts private college, will provide college credit courses to eligible high school students in areas such as art, music, theater and dance.

“Through P.U.L.S.E. we will redefine what it means to be a community partner, redefine what it means to serve, redefine with discipline and a mind ever-ready to relearn what it means to prepare young men and women to lead in the future they will create,” said Wyatt.

“Students will benefit from the mentorship and teaching of Coker’s distinguished faculty, and have the privilege of learning in extraordinary facilities such as the Elizabeth Boatwright Coker Performing Arts Center, the newly-renovated Margaret Coker Lawton Music Building and the Gladys C. Fort Art Building,” Wyatt said.

“This is a red letter day folks,” said Dr. Murray Brockman, president of the S.C. Governor’s School for Science and Mathematics. Brockman said the new program will create a wealth of new learning opportunities for high school students in Hartsville. “In short, if you’re in high school in this community, the sky’s the limit,” he said.

Brockman said the Governor’s School will offer supplements to and expansions of Hartsville High School’s successful International Baccalaureate program.

“We recognize the critical role that science and math will play in the worldwide economy in the future,” Brockman said. “At GSSM, we will offer advanced topics in science and math. We will allow students to explore more deeply or more widely than what’s available in IB.”

“Through partnership and mutual support, and shared vision, we are poised to accelerate achievement and to move into uncharted territory,” Brockman said.

He said the new partnership will help remove many of the obstacles to student achievement resulting from budget cuts and other restraints facing public schools. “We want the only limit to students’ achievement to be what’s inside of them – their talent, their drive, their ambition, their commitment, their willingness to sacrifice and to work hard to achieve,” he said.

DeLoach said Sonoco’s financial commitment to the project is in keeping with the company’s longstanding tradition of support for public education in the Hartsville area.

But he said he believes the program can help Sonoco as well. “Unfortunately, Sonoco has been experiencing a drain of talent in Hartsville,” he said. “More than one hundred of our top managers live outside of the community in Florence, Columbia, Charlotte and points in between. Frankly, we’ve lost top talent because of concerns (or more likely the perception) that Hartsville schools are not the best they can be. We’re going to try to fix that through the P.U.L.S.E. program.”

DeLoach said public-private partnerships like P.U.L.S.E. are what is needed to bring real educational reform to public education in South Carolina. “The days of depending on flashy new Washington programs or increased funding from Columbia are likely gone forever,” he said.

“Making our schools better must be accomplished at the local level. Parents, teachers, administrators and business people must work together to mentor, support and, when necessary, push our young people to greater performance.”