THOMASVILLE – A Thomasville City Schools program aimed at getting students back on the right track has a new home.

School officials learned about a year ago that the system’s Alternative Learning Center would need to move because the Baptist Children’s Home said they needed the building the program was using at the Mills Home. Finding a new home for the Alternative Learning Center, Thomasville City Schools bought a building and renovated it over the summer.

After about six weeks of renovating the 5,000-square-foot building, construction crews finished the new facility, located at 19 E. Guilford St., for occupancy on Aug. 18.

“I love it,” said Terrell Scott, principal of the Alternative Learning Center. “It’s been really good for teacher and student morale.”

Keith Tobin, superintendent for Thomasville City Schools, said the system bought the building, which formerly housed an accounting firm, for $150,000. Tobin said renovating the facility for the Alternative Center will cost the system about $300,000 when phase two of the project is completed. According to Tobin, phase two will consist of adding a computer lab and making a basketball court behind the Alternative Learning Center.

“It’s amazing the transformation that’s gone in this building,” Tobin said. “It has been completely gutted inside and all new wiring, all new plumbing and all new heating and air.”

Dee Kirkland, a 10th grader at the Alternative Learning Center, said the new building was “like a new start” for the school year. The Alternative Learning Center helps students who have been expelled in middle and high school fix habits that got them in trouble before returning to the traditional classroom. Kirkland, who is on a six-week plan at the school, said he hopes to return to Thomasville High School to play basketball.

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