The Central Educational Center has been awarded a $150,000 Georgia Career Academy Project grant to help expand the charter school’s music and video production programs.

The grant, administered through the Technical College System of Georgia, is competitively awarded to Georgia’s growing system of Career Academies which are, in part, based on Coweta’s Central Educational Center (CEC) charter school model, according to Coweta schools Public Information Officer Dean Jackson.

The grant “will help expand a very unique set of partnerships that will increase CEC’s video production capabilities and our music production capabilities,” said Mark Whitlock, CEC’s Chief Executive Officer. Whitlock said the funding will be used to upgrade equipment in teacher Michael Britt’s Broadcast Video program and allow the program to train students in a more production-based curriculum with the school’s business partners.

That program partners with Newnan-based digital media company NuLink, among others, and NuLink houses its local production studios on the charter school’s campus.

Jackson said the grant will also help the CEC and the University of Georgia-based Dallas Austin Business Certificate Program develop a sound recording studio for use by broadcast video students and students in Dr. Lyn Schenbeck’s Business of the Arts program.

The expansion of the programs will help CEC develop an on-campus Associate Degree program in Digital Media offered by West Georgia Technical College. Whitlock said that the University of Georgia has also expressed an interest in offering its Music Business certificate program offered through the Terry College of Business at CEC as well.

Georgia’s film-industry tax credits have significantly expanded the entertainment industry’s presence in Georgia, to the tune of $2 billion in the state, noted Whitlock. 

“And as a community, because of entities like the Centre for Performing and Visual Arts and Riverwood Studios, we are well-positioned to take advantage of those opportunities. Technical and production account for 80 percent of the jobs in that industry, and there are tremendous opportunities for well-trained, talented graduates,” said Whitlock.

Whitlock recognized Britt, Schenbeck, West Georgia Technical College Coweta Campus Director Tonya Whitlock, NuLink executive Lana Mobley (also a CEC board member), Dallas Austin Foundation Director Bernard Cook and UGA Music Business Certificate Program Bruce Burch for successfully leading CEC’s GCAP grant proposal.

In making application for the grant, “they worked backward from what the industry actually needs in terms of a skilled workforce,” said Whitlock. “That’s the culture and commitment at CEC, and the basis of all of our community partnership.”

The competitive grants are awarded only to Georgia’s growing number of Career Academies, Jackson said. The academies high school students career and college preparation through industry-based approaches, and offer credit towards high school graduation and through partnering post-secondary institutions, said Jackson.

Jackson said Whitlock and others at CEC can also take some extra satisfaction in being awarded a Georgia Career Academy Project grant since the charter school served as a principal model for those academies.

“There are about 20 Career Academies operating in Georgia now, so we were fortunate as an existing career academy to receive this funding,” Whitlock said.  “I think that speaks well of our partnership and our plan.”

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