Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Indiana Professors Propose African Boarding School


Indiana Professors Propose African Boarding School: INDIANAPOLIS — Some Indiana University professors have proposed a novel way to give struggling inner-city students a fresh start: send them to boarding school in Africa. The project is still in its planning phase, and its backers admit it faces legal and financial hurdles. But the professors want to establish a school in the West African nation of Ghana where Indiana teachers would instruct some of the state's poorest children.

'The core idea is to pull kids out of an environment where they cannot thrive and put them in one where they can,' said law professor Kevin Brown, who leads the group behind the idea.

Backers would have to raise $4 million in donations to build the school, but the $10,000 or so the state pays urban districts for a student's education each year would cover the classes, room, board and travel, said Brown, who teaches at the university’s Bloomington campus.