Some professional assistance

As it turns out the little house around the corner is charming.  It does need some renovations but it is almost across the street from the elementary school, which means advertising to our target audience would be greatly simplified.  It is also zoned correctly, sits on an acre of land, and is about a mile from my house---sweet.

Today I spent most of the day with the architect, the fire inspector, the folks at planning and zoning, and the realtor.  This house is very doable, but we had to hire an architect to draw plans as the house was built in 1936, and we will need to add a bathroom and open up a few walls.   We will also need to hire an engineer for the site plan.  The owners of the house are custom builders and will give us a bid on doing the required work.  We are hoping they will do most of the work at cost so that they can sell the house and we can include the cost of renovations in the mortgage--feel free to add any and all of that to your prayer lists for us!

I believe that private schools should be accountable to an outside agency.  The preschools I have directed or owned have always been licensed and often won awards.  We want to have our elementary program accredited by the Georgia Accrediting Commission.  This will not only give credibility to our program, but more importantly, it will allow us to accept SB10 Scholarship money from our parents.  This will not only be of great value to our parents, but will virtually assure us a full class.

We moved to GA in the summer of 2006 and in the spring of 2007 our Govenor signed SB10 into law; he signed it on my birthday. :)  This is designed for children with special needs who have been in the public school system and have an active IEP for at least one year.  Should they decide to enroll their child in a private school, they are eligible for scholarship funds from the state--funds which will continue through the 12th grade!  The interesting thing is that schools must qualify to receive the scholarships, but they do NOT have to do anything to accommodate the needs of the student!!  In order to qualify, the school must be accredited and complete all of the paperwork for the scholarships correctly.  We can qualify as a non-traditional program, but by July 1, 2013 we must have a campus that is at least 4 acres.

So, while the architect was here we walked the 7 acres that we found two weeks ago--did I not mention that yet?  Oh yeah, God is just showing Himself faithful in so many ways.  We were driving on a road near our shop that we travel all the time, but just noticed a little "for sale by owner" sign. The 7 acres are about 5 miles from the house and the owner will finance the property! Since we know we have only 3 years to build on at least 4 acres, this was an unexpected blessing!  It is in a great location and the architect walked it today with us and felt was a great property--flat enough but with some great trees!  Not sure how we are going to finance two properties at once, but we are taking this one step at a time.

Lastly we are supposed to sign with a grant writer/coach tonight.  It is exciting, scary, fun, and amazing watching God orchestrate this amazing adventure!  Thanks for your prayers!