Barren County schools BAVEL program expands to serve more grade levels

GLASGOW Ky.-The Barren County School District made an announcement Monday evening involving the expansion of a long-time program.

The program is called BAVEL, and it was announced that course offerings will be expanded to students in  kindergarten through fifth grade starting fall of 2021. Prior to this, grades six through 12 were eligible.

BAVEL stands for Barren Academy of Virtual and Expanded Learning. The program has been around since 2004, and it’s meant to help students who learn better outside the walls of the typical classroom. Soon, students in grades kindergarten and up will be able to utilize it.

Co-director of BAVEL Phillip Napier said the world of education is constantly evolving, especially in our current times, and that this was the perfect opportunity for BAVEL to expand.

“As we think about the foundation that we’ve established with BAVEL over the years and the support systems that we’ve put in place, add on the shifts that we’ve seen take place due to the pandemic, it really seemed logical to expand offerings to grades K through 5,” Napier said.

The BAVEL program has served nearly 3,000 students which account for over 15,000 individual course enrollments. The success rate has been very high in years past.