Excel Center to open location in Columbus

The Excel Center is not your traditional high school.

Ages for students at the state-funded charter school range from 20 to 60. In a year’s time, a student can earn every credit required to receive a high school diploma.

The tuition-free public school, which has 12 locations across Indiana, is operated by Goodwill Education Initiatives, Inc., an organization formed by Goodwill of Central & Southern Indiana. Its funding comes from the Indiana state legislature.

The Excel Center’s mission is to give Indiana high school dropouts a second chance at earning a high school diploma.

It has five locations in Indianapolis plus seven in central and southern Indiana cities of Anderson, Clarksville, Kokomo, Lafayette, Noblesville, Richmond and Shelbyville.

Goodwill Education Initiatives is looking to expand into four additional Indiana communities, including Columbus, and received permission to do that June 7 from the Indiana Charter School Board.

“Our effort is to take folks between the ages of 18 and whatever and help them really get on that path to economic self-sufficiency through education and work beyond our doors,” said Betsy Delgado, Goodwill’s vice president of mission and education initiatives.

For more on this story, see Wednesday’s Republic.