In-Depth: Education (part 3) from WGBY. Carrie Saldo
visits the BART Charter School in Adams, MA. BART is a
tuition-free, college prep charter school serving grades 6-12 in
Berkshire County.
New Market Tax Credit Program
Berkshire Arts & Technology Charter Public School
Adams, MA
$6,000,000
www.bartcharter.org
In 2005, the Berkshire Arts &
Technology School (BArT) needed $4 million to purchase and
renovate a 29,532 sq.ft industrial building located in a Brownfield
Redevelopment Area in Massachusetts that it was leasing. CSDC's
non-traditional financing resulted in a blended interest rate of
1.10%, substantially below the 7.81% rate available for commercial
facilities at that time. This represented $1.2 million in savings
to the school and made it possible for the school to qualify for
no-cash-down-payment financing, despite its short two-year
operating history.
In their rehabilitated space, BArT's low-income rural students,
for whom educational choices are otherwise very limited, are
outpacing their peers in the state in academic growth, despite
significant special educational needs.
