Monday, April 26, 2010 -
TOM WILEMON - The Daily News -

New leadership at the Memphis Academy of Science and Engineering (MASE) is seeking partners to support the school’s mission of transforming at-risk students into future college graduates.

The state’s oldest and largest charter school will embark on a fundraising campaign next month that offers donors the opportunity to sponsor teachers, buy textbooks and provide technology upgrades.

“We get students who have failed or are from failing schools,” said Harold Wingood, executive director of MASE. “They come here already with a history of academic deficiencies.”

Although the school was founded in 2003 and has a good word-of-mouth reputation with partners, Charlie Quinn, director of development and fundraising, said its story is not widely known.

“What we want to do is start to raise the bar a little bit and make sure the corporations are aware of it,” he said.

One new initiative in the works is to find corporate sponsorships for teacher positions. One sponsorship of $60,000 would free up money to buy textbooks.

The school is seeking other donations, similar to the recent gift of $2,400 worth of calculators by Baptist Memorial Health Care Corp.

One of the primary goals for the school this year is for 100 percent of the 85 seniors in the class of 2010 to get a college acceptance letter. Last year, the senior class achieved a 100 percent graduation rate.

But MASE has a lot more work to do.

“We just did a very rigorous assessment,” Wingood said. “It was very sobering. It showed us some things we were doing well, but more things we really needed to work on to be true to our mission.

“We’re in the process of restructuring our curriculum, restructuring our classrooms and restructuring our assessment tools to be at the place where we are producing college-rate students who can go on in engineering or science or math.”

Wingood came to Memphis to lead the charter school from Worcester, Mass., where he was associate provost and dean of admission and financial aid at Clark University.

The new leadership team also includes Janis Jesse, who is chief operating officer, and Quinn.

A donor, who recognized MASE needed to raise more money from private donors, funded Quinn’s position.

Charter schools in Memphis receive about $7,300 per student compared to the approximately $10,300 per student at city schools.

“Our challenge is to try to do more with less,” Quinn said.

Recently, the school had to put off buying textbooks it needed because of a budget crunch.

Wingood said donations are contributions toward the city’s future work force.

“We have students from 31 ZIP codes in Memphis,” he said. “Our attendance rate is somewhere in the 90 percent range. Our parents make sure their children come from all over Memphis to get to school here because they believe in what we do here and our vision going forward.

“They believe at the end of the day, this is the kind of place that will prepare their children for going to college.”

For more information about taking part in the campaign, call Quinn at 866-1642 or visit www.discovermase.org.