Jones Academy building

In many ways, residential schools can offer much more than traditional schools, said Joyce Culbreath, executive education director for the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. That’s one reason the tribe is building a new elementary school at the Jones Academy, located near Hartshorne on state Highway 270.

Plans call for the new building to encompass 40,273 square feet at a cost of $7,162,560.

Groundbreaking for the new school building will be April 4.

“I’m very excited about this,” Culbreath said. “It’s an absolutely wonderful, beautiful school.

“When you have a residential program you can do all sorts of things you can’t do at a regular school.”

Take music for instance. At a traditional school, students attend class for an hour or so, then go home to practice — often with no one around to tell them if they are practicing the wrong way. At Jones Academy, fine arts instruction can be held in the evening, Culbreath said, giving students more time to practice and more direct feedback while they’re practicing. In addition, residential schools can also offer programs in anything from dance to horsemanship — “There are just all kinds of things,” Culbreath said, adding the tribe has been working on getting a new elementary school building for four years.

According to an article by J.N. Kagey in the December 1926 issue of “Chronicles of Oklahoma,” the Choctaw Nation has operated boarding schools since 1860.

Jones Academy, established in 1891, was “one of the youngest of Choctaw institutions” at the time the article was published “but in a short time it has made an enviable record.”

“Jones Academy has always been, and continues to be, a residential learning center, although the scope of its programs has changed over the years,” Chief Gregory E. Pyle wrote in a letter about the new elementary school.

In 1952 the federal government stopped vocational and academic programs at schools funded by the Bureau of Indian Affairs, so Jones Academy students started attending classes in Hartshorne.

But the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma has been working to get on-site academic programs back at Jones Academy. In 2003, the nation started providing classes in temporary facilities.

“We’ve brought in two grades every year,” Culbreath said, adding elementary students will continue receiving instruction in the temporary buildings until the new school building is opened in August 2007.

According to Administrator Brad Spears, the academic portion of Jones Academy falls under the purview of Hartshorne Public Schools. In fact, officials said, students in the seventh through 12 grades are bused to Hartshorne to attend classes each day.