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An offering known as a Pearson Center will soon open in the J.P. King Jr. Career and Technical Academy that will provide opportunities for Franklin City Public Schools students and teachers and also members of the public to take tests for academic requirements, licenses and work credentials.

Dr. Tanieka Ricks, FCPS assistant superintendent of student services, human resources and career and technical education, shared details on the Pearson Center with the Franklin City School Board at its Thursday, Jan. 16, meeting.

“We’re looking to open the Pearson Center in February,” she said. “We will have a grand opening when we have the CTE Expo in the later spring.”

She said the center will be open for eight hours a week, rotating on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. 

“We’ll be able to administer assessments for students and also assessments for teachers who need specific licensures and credentials,” she said. “So we’re looking forward to that opportunity as well.”

Ward 2 Board Member Arwen Councill asked if the center will be open to the community in February, and Ricks confirmed that it will be.

“Of course, our teachers and students will have quick access to be able to take assessments, but we will have to open it up publicly, so it will be announced,” Ricks said. “We’ll have to share it with the public.”

Ricks noted that specific details of the Pearson Center will be outlined in the next School Board meeting, but at Councill’s request, she shared a summary Jan. 16 of how the center will benefit the community.

“The Pearson Center is a center where we offer teacher assessments, student assessments, and we’ll also be able to offer GED testing for the community, anyone that signs up for testing,” Ricks said. “So they will sign up for whatever test they desire to take, and then they’ll be able to come to the Pearson Center to take those tests.

“We will have a Pearson Center testing center, and then we will have a check-in center,” she continued. “In the check-in center, we’ll be able to promote different activities, different events that we have going on within the division, so that’ll be an opportunity for promotion as well.

“But that’s the main purpose of that center is to provide assessments for different licensure, different criteria, different student assessments that they have to take as well,” she said.

FCPS Superintendent Dr. Carlton Carter added, “And Ms. Councill, what makes this unique is there’s not another center within a 50-mile radius. So that’s part of the criteria for it to be accepted.”

Carter emphasized that the Pearson Center coming to the J.P. King Jr. Career and Technical Academy is something that is for the region. 

“And so we will also be soliciting local businesses who may need licensure to come into the Pearson Center,” he said. “And so this could also be a gamechanger for getting a highly skilled workforce.”

FCPS Assistant Superintendent of Operations Dr. Clint Walters provided a brief update on the physical preparations for the center during the School Board’s Dec. 12 work session.

His slideshow presentation cited the following:

• Demolition of sink and storage is complete;
• Lights have been replaced with LED bulbs; 
• Room has been painted; and 
• Submitting pictures to Pearson for their review and feedback.

“I am tremendously proud of the work that the maintenance team and the custodial teams have done to prepare this space,” he told board members. “If you walk into this room at J.P. King, please have sunglasses on. They have replaced the lightbulbs with LEDs, they have put new paint on the walls, they really have done an excellent, excellent job in preparing this space.

“So we are taking pictures to submit to Pearson for their review,” he continued. “They have a very specific protocol that any spaces that are administering Pearson tests have to abide by. And so we’re in a really good place with this.”

He shared a couple photos with the board in his presentation.

“Those pictures will be sent off next week for Pearson to provide us with some feedback on what we need in order to move forward,” he said. “I will say we already have purchase orders in place for the computers and other necessary equipment to transition to this space as soon as we have approval.”

Ward 4 Board Member and Board Vice Chair Cristina Boone said that in her past experiences with Pearson Centers, the desks are cubicles to help prevent test-takers from seeing their neighbor’s results.

No partitions were present in the photos shared by Walters, but he noted that at that point, the guidelines he and his staff were aware of simply required four feet of space between work stations, and he was not sure if cubicle desks were necessary.

Ward 1 Board Member and Board Chair Robert Holt said, “One thing about the Pearson Center is you can have two or three different kinds of tests going on at one time,” making a neighbor’s activity irrelevant in some cases.