CSUN Provides Temporary Space for Charter School

Having finally secured both a permanent and temporary location, the principal of the San Fernando Valley’s first charter middle school says it will open on Sept. 7 with 100 sixth-graders.

The opening of Community Charter Middle had been in jeopardy last week because the principal needed a temporary site while permits and remodeling were being completed on the school’s permanent location.

Cal State Northridge, which is in a partnership with the school, agreed late Thursday to lend it several classrooms in the education building, a patio and possible time in a computer lab.

“How befitting that the school starts off on a university campus, because that’s where we hope the students will end up,” Jackie Elliot, principal and founder of the charter middle school, said Friday.

By early fall, Elliot said, she expects to move into the school’s permanent location, a former preschool with 6,000 square feet, ample outdoor space and a multipurpose room at 1441 Celis St. in San Fernando.

The school plans to enroll 300 sixth- through eighth-graders by 2001.

The search for a permanent site has been difficult. Before settling on the Celis Street location, the school was planned for the Boys & Girls Club of the San Fernando Valley in Pacoima, but that was scrapped for more spacious quarters in a medical suite at 11500 Eldridge Ave.

Last month, Elliot had to drop plans for that site, after learning the school would be housed in the same building as an adult mental health facility that treats criminal offenders.

“We’re very pleased and thankful to CSUN,” Elliot said. “Now we know the school is going to open.”