Education Story Archives - Page 2 of 116 - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Nitro High School Teacher Awarded $25,000 For Excellence In Education

A national education-focused foundation selected a Kanawha County teacher for his excellence in teaching and awarded him an unrestricted $25,000 cash prize.

Nitro High School’s engineer-turned-educator, Adam Wolfe, had the surprise of a lifetime Tuesday morning at a seemingly routine assembly.

Wolfe, a math and engineering teacher, was as shocked as his students when Milken Educator Awards Vice President Stephanie Bishop declared him the winner.

“Adam Wolfe really stands out as being an innovator,” Bishop said. “He is all about hands-on learning in his engineering and math classes. And because of his dedication to this community and being a problem solver, we sought him out as the Milken Educator for 2024.”

There is no application process for this award. Each year, the foundation selects teachers from across the U.S. to recognize excellence in teaching with an unrestricted $25,000 cash prize.

The winner is left a complete surprise to everyone except the state’s Department of Education — and perhaps the school’s principal and some administrators.

Wolfe is West Virginia’s only 2024 to 2025 Milken Educator Award recipient, but the state’s 80th teacher named a Milken Educator since the program began in 1987.

From left: Milken Educator Awards Vice President Stephanie E. Bishop, Brian Allman, Brian Barth, Adam Wolfe, Dr. Erika Klose, Michele Blatt and Tom Williams.

*Milken Family Foundation*

Wolfe stood out to the Milken Foundation because he uses his experience as a former engineer to support students and connect them to community projects and internship opportunities.

“We are working with the state Department of Education here in West Virginia to find the best of the best,” Bishop said. “We are looking for the top 1 percent of educators to be Milken Educators in this state.”

Wolfe said he felt shock, gratitude, humility and some guilt because he thinks many other excellent teachers at Nitro High School deserve the recognition.

“It’s awesome to be recognized for this, and I hope I do make an impact on my kids’ lives, but I know I’m certainly not the only person in the building who does that,” Wolfe said. “I don’t pretend to know what’s best for those kids. But, as I said earlier, I hope to give them the space for them to figure that out.”

In addition to recognition and the cash prize, Wolfe won an all-expense paid trip to an education forum in Los Angeles, Ca. in April 2025.

Back in the classroom, math and engineering teacher Adam Wolfe teaches his ninth-grade students a lesson.

*Milken Family Foundation*

Millions Announced For School Building, Maintenance Projects

Updated Dec. 17, 2024 at 5 p.m.

The West Virginia School Building Authority (SBA) announced $65 million in funding for 12 school infrastructure projects, including the construction of four new schools. The SBA is a state organization that oversees and funds school construction and educational planning, according to its website.

Counties receiving funds to build new schools include:

County	Award	Project
Putnam	$8,333,333	Construction of the new Hurricane Middle School. This is a multi-year commitment with the same recurring payment over three years for a total award sum of $25,000,000.
Kanawha	$6,774,534	Construction of the new Upper Kanawha Valley Consolidated (Dupont) Elementary School. This is a multi-year commitment with the same recurring payment over three years for a total award sum of $20,323,602.
Monongalia	$16,982,966	Construction of the new Suncrest Middle School. The award is a multiyear commitment, with two payments: $11,400,437 in Fiscal Year 2025 and $5,582,529 in Fiscal Year 2026
Berkeley	$4,000,000	Construction of the new Inwood Learning Center.

Counties receiving funds to renovate existing schools include:

County	Award	Project
Harrison	$5,313,402	Expansion of the Robert C. Byrd Career & Technical Center and the cafeteria at Mountaineer Middle School.
Monroe	$4,523,124	Additions and renovations at James Monroe High School Technical Center.
Greenbrier	$14,000,000	Additions and renovations at White Sulphur Springs Elementary School.
Logan	$3,596,734	HVAC, electrical, and fire alarm replacements at Man High School.
Grant	$1,861,100	Safe school additions and renovations at Petersburg High School.
Marion	$2,774,945	Improve safe school entrances at nine schools across Marion County.
Pleasants	$1,499,590	Interior electrical upgrades, lighting, ceilings, and sprinkler system improvements at Pleasants County Middle School.
Hardy	$922,800	Security upgrades at East Hardy Elementary School and Moorefield Middle School.

“This investment is more than just classrooms and buildings,” Gov. Jim Justice said in a press release. “It’s about giving our kids the resources they need to thrive in West Virginia. This is another huge win for our students, our communities, and our entire state. Not to mention that it’s creating hundreds of construction jobs for these new schools, too. When you think about how far we’ve come as a state, it’s truly remarkable. For too long, West Virginia was a place nobody paid attention to, but that’s not the case any more. We’re shattering records left and right, including our investments in our schools. I couldn’t be more proud of the improvements we’ve made in education, because it’s only going to continue to get better and better.”

The awards come as the West Virginia Board of Education has approved 25 school closures and consolidations, citing declining enrollment that has led to decreased funding, as well as aging and costly infrastructure.

Editors Note: This web post was updated to reflect corrected numbers from the governor’s office for Hardy County.

Campus Improvements Coming To Shepherd University

Residence hall renovations, a new dining hall and athletic facilities improvements are currently planned for Shepherd University, backed by $30 million in state funds.

Shepherd University is preparing for a slate of campus improvement projects, backed by $30 million in state funds.

The university plans to renovate several residence halls, according to a Dec. 10 press release. It will also build a new dining hall, multipurpose building and maintenance facility.

The West Virginia Legislature approved $15 million in supplemental funding for the projects during its October special legislative session.

The additional $15 million comes from the Governor’s Civil Contingent Fund, according to a funding agreement shared with West Virginia Public Broadcasting by CJ Harvey, director of communications for Gov. Jim Justice.

The contingency fund is a pool of discretionary funding that the governor can allocate to state projects and emergency response efforts. In an email, Harvey wrote that the money comes from a part of the fund “specifically used for deferred maintenance” on West Virginia colleges and universities.

Shepherd officials say the new funding will help improve campus facilities in ways that particularly benefit students.

“This dining facility will expand our capacity for serving students and enhance our ability to bring programs and events for students and visitors to campus,” said Scott Barton, Shepherd vice president for finance and administration, in the press release.

Shepherd President Mary Hendrix said in the press release that enhancing campus will help “keep Shepherd University a vibrant school of choice for students in West Virginia and beyond.”

Shepherd has not announced a timeline for when the projects will be completed, but Executive Director of University Communications Hans Fogle told West Virginia Public Broadcasting that the additional funding will expedite campus improvements at large.

“Many of the projects that we design come based on feedback from our students telling us that they want to have more options for dining, that they want to have things located closer to the residence halls,” he said. “We hear that feedback, and we are happy to be able to work toward the goals that they have helped us set.”

Student Dual Enrollment Programs Boosted By Legislative Support

The West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission (HEPC) announced at its meeting Friday an 11.5 percent increase in high school dual enrollment programs, which allow students to earn college credit while still in high school.

A pilot program to help high school students earn college credit is starting to pay dividends after just one year.

In 2023, House Bill 2005 created and funded LevelUpWV, a four year dual enrollment pilot program that commission members credited with spurring the large jump.

Zornitsa Georgieva, senior director of research for the commission, said the increase in program engagement at individual institutions has been significant.

“Some of those are pretty high,” she said. “We have 42 percent at Fairmont State. We have 64 percent in Marshall University, 38.5 percent at Concord University. So we are seeing those increases.”

With less than half of all West Virginia high school graduates pursuing post-secondary education, commission members hope dual enrollment will help boost the state’s college going rate. The college going rate is defined as the percentage of public high school students who enrolled in a college, university or career technical/vocational school following graduation.

Sarah Tucker, West Virginia’s Chancellor of Higher Education, announced the creation of an interagency college going work group with the West Virginia Department of Education, focused on increasing the state’s college going rate.

“We’re really trying to work together to figure out how to get that college going rate up in our state,” Tucker said. “We know it’s 47 percent and that’s simply not good enough for any of us.”

Georgieva also reported that enrollment of first time freshmen was down more than 3 percent year to year, a change that Tucker said was in part due to issues with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, last year.

The FAFSA unlocks both federal and state financial aid for students. The federal government released a shortened FAFSA at the end of 2023 that was intended to simplify the financial aid process for students, but the rollout of the new form was plagued with delays and technical issues.

“The FAFSA debacle really contributed to what happened this fall, obviously not for international students, but for our first time freshmen the national drops are almost 6 percent,” Tucker said. “Enrollment for first time freshmen nationally had been trending up for a number of years, and this year, suddenly, it tanked, and that is attributed to what happened with the FAFSA.”

Shepherd University Will Auto Admit Local Grads Based On GPA

Many graduates of Berkeley County Schools will now be accepted to college in West Virginia’s Eastern Panhandle without formally submitting an application.

Many graduates of Berkeley County Schools (BCS) will now be accepted to college in West Virginia’s Eastern Panhandle without formally submitting an application.

That is because Shepherd University has launched a new initiative automatically admitting local high school graduates with a grade point average of 2.5 or higher, announced in a Thursday press release.

Graduates of Hedgesville High School, Martinsburg High School, Musselman High School and Spring Mills High School are eligible for the program.

Shepherd and BCS estimate 1,030 local students “are on track for automatic acceptance” this spring, according to the press release.

Through the program, students do not have to take action to receive admission. Instead, those that qualify will receive a letter denoting their admission.

“This is a wonderful program for our students,” said BCS Superintendent Ryan Saxe in the press release. “Shepherd is a part of the Eastern Panhandle community, but this initiative will connect them to our high schools in a meaningful way for students.”

The program’s launch comes as colleges and universities nationwide struggle with declining first-year enrollment. While Shepherd has seen an increase in its total enrollment since 2022, the student population sits well below figures from one decade ago.

Shepherd is not the only university in West Virginia making the admissions process easier for local students.

In May, the West Virginia University (WVU) Institute of Technology established a similar automatic admissions program for high school graduates in 13 southern West Virginia counties. In August, Marshall University launched an automatic admissions initiative of its own for schools in seven counties.

In the future, Shepherd hopes to expand the program to Jefferson and Morgan counties, according to the press release.

“We are so excited about this partnership and what it means for the young people who will be the leaders of tomorrow,” Shepherd President Mary J.C. Hendrix said in the release.

New Report Ranks State School Spending Below Average

State Board of Education members continue to urge state lawmakers to revisit the school funding formula. A new study looks at state school funding across the country.

West Virginia’s funding for public schools scores below the national average, according to the Making the Grade report, an annual overview of the condition of school finance in the states.

The report comes from the public education nonprofit Education Law Center, which focuses on school funding equity, non-discrimination for public school students and other issues affecting public school quality.

West Virginia got a B grade for its “funding effort,” defined as spending per student as a percentage of state GDP – the value of goods and services produced by the state. Slightly more than 3 percent percent of the state’s GDP goes towards students, ranking West Virginia 14th in the country.

However, West Virginia’s spending compared to GDP fell by 14 percent year over year, one of the largest drops in the country. The decline follows a national trend that has brought the average effort index among states in 2022 – the most recent year with complete data – to its lowest point in the last decade.

West Virginia’s overall funding level received a C, with overall per pupil spending $700 less than the national average. Nominally, the state spent just 1 percent less per pupil in 2021 than it did in 2020, but adjusted for inflation that number jumps to an 8 percent reduction.

The report acknowledges that “with inflation as high as it was between 2021 and 2022, even significant revenue increases may not actually translate into more purchasing power.”

Only eight states had more per-pupil funding available when inflation is taken into consideration. West Virginia’s reduction in overall spending was enough to drop it four points in the rankings and into the bottom half, from 25th to 29th.

For funding distribution, West Virginia received a D. The report points to distribution, specifically more funding being delivered to educate students in high-poverty districts, as the hallmark of a fair and equitable school finance system.

With similar funding levels in high- and low-poverty districts, West Virginia’s funding was described as having a “flat” distribution system. Analysis shows state spending is 2 percent higher in low-poverty districts, a difference of about $300 per pupil.

The report presents a picture of school funding in the 2021-2022 school year, the most recent data available, and therefore does not capture the full impact of charter schools and vouchers on the educational landscape. In its conclusion, the Making the Grade report highlights the effects of voucher programs like the Hope Scholarship to funding for public education.

Reduced state funding, driven by declining enrollment, has repeatedly come up as a driving factor in the state’s approval of more than 25 school closures this year.