An Allentown resident will open a private high school on Main Street in the borough this fall.
By: Scott Morgan
HIGHTSTOWN In the glinting, chrome-heavy lab room, Arthur Poulos crumples his 6½-foot frame over the small glass-and-metal box he called an analytical balance to demonstrate how it measures weights to within 10-thousandths of a degree of accuracy. Behind him sit the silver tables and silver stools and glass beakers and elaborate posters of cellular functions that could only mean there will be science here.
Through the doorway to his left sit the longer, wooden tabletops that soon will be lined with computers and books and students. This setup provides the other side of the scale. There will be humanities here as well. And it all will be here in September.
This is the SciCore Academy, the borough’s newest private high school; a sophist-esque center of learning tucked neatly into a second-floor office space of a Main Street building once called the Old Hights Theater. But though it occupies a modest space, SciCore is a school governed by a pair of big-league mantras: "Academic excellence at an affordable cost" and "The education your teenager deserves."
If you haven’t heard of SciCore, it’s because the school, for at least the next three months, is still getting its act together. Make no mistake, this is as close to ready as you can get; it’s more a matter of finalizing the roster and placing the last of the equipment. But come Sept. 2, SciCore is open for business. And for knowledge.
Built as an answer to flagging academic standards and school district overcrowding, SciCore is intentionally smaller by design, according to Dr. Poulos, a resident of Allentown and the academy’s founder and principal "Headmaster just sounds pretentious," he said. A physical chemist by training, science consultant and seven-year veteran of teaching the physical sciences at Rutgers University, Dr. Poulos has taken a "solidly middle class" pragmatism to high school education.
"My wife and I have four kids," he said. "And we believe in education. We want children to have the best academically. And in talking with friends, (we realized) a lot of public high schools are just not capable of providing sufficiently solid academics."
Many public schools, he said, are "busting out at the seams." The alternative is private education, but as tuitions can be more than a little intimidating to most pocketbooks, there often is little for parents to do but send their children to free public school or often-crowded parochial schools.
So Dr. Poulos asked himself a question is it possible to have an affordable private high school? Two years of research into student needs and state mandates provided the answer you can do it if you stay small; and in December, Dr. Poulos signed his lease and hung his hopes (along with his storefront sign) on Main Street. The magic price turned out to be $6,000 per student per year.
As a comparison, tuition for nonboarding students at The Peddie School for the next school year will be $22,400.
In the academy library, where the history books are not the standardized texts and the fiction is not just collections of interpretive essays on Shakespeare, it is easier to see the bigger picture Dr. Poulos sees. These texts compiled around a U-shaped set of tables, are not interpretations of other peoples’ histories and observations, they are source materials. Students will not read a publisher’s version of the American Revolution, they will read Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin and other works from those who actually lived the history. They will study math and sciences by doing experiments and solving practical problems. They will study government by taking part in its machinations and by directly observing what governing bodies do.
"Understanding how the system works is very, very important," Dr. Poulos said. He added, "We need to stimulate reading, too. It is so important for students to read."
And unlike many schools, art and music will be considered vital, irreplaceable components of a balanced education.
"We’re a little bit odd," he said.
But in this small space, built for only 16 students (although Dr. Poulos said he plans to expand as the school grows), it also is easy to question how SciCore intends to handle other state requirements, mainly a gym class. A converted office space is fine for reading, but there obviously is no room for basketball courts and soccer fields. Dr. Poulos’ conclusion?
"We’re going to teach karate," he said. It doesn’t take up much room and it’s good for mind and body. "And in terms of discipline, it’s wonderful," he said.
But while all of this innovation and back-to-basics learning sounds like a brave new world, Dr. Poulos is aware of the tough sell, too. After all, he admits, SciCore has two main hurdles. One is its very name, which he said people often think signals a science-heavy curriculum, or even a learning center whose classes provide supplemental help for students having trouble in traditional high school.
Perish the thought. SciCore, Dr. Poulos said, is a 100-percent high school that will focus on a scrupulous balance of all core academic subjects. Hence the second half of the academy’s name. The first half, by the way, refers to the application of scientific objectivity and pragmatism to education.
The second trouble is that SciCore is brand new.
"People are doing a wait and see," Dr. Poulos said. "We have a lot of educating to do."
And that means parents. Without results to back up his intentions, Dr. Poulos said it likely will be tough to convince people that SciCore is a good idea. But being a scientist by trade, Dr. Poulos also is used to weighing risks and building hypotheses into workable models. The trick "You just can’t be rigid," he said. "You have to be flexible."
What early criticism there has been, Dr. Poulos said, has come from friends and acquaintances. One friend, he said, told him the academy is a foolish endeavor because "Parents just aren’t interested enough in their children’s education to take this kind of risk." Another told him, "You’ll get your ass sued off."
But in the face of this criticism comes a more important source of encouragement from the very parents who want their children to receive a private, rounded, education without going into hock to do it. Has such encouragement soothed Dr. Poulos’ nerves?
"Yes!"
What also helps is the level of interest in the school. As SciCore’s name gets out through advertisements and word of mouth, and as more prospective students come by to interview and take the two-part math/English entry test, the chance of an additional grade grows more likely. Originally, Dr. Poulos intended to begin with just a freshman class of 12 to 16 students (students, by the way, who can come from anywhere, not just the borough or the township). But there are more people interested in coming in as sophomores than he had expected, leading Dr. Poulos to consider leaving the gate with a ninth and 10th grade.
"But the jury’s still out on that one," he said.
Even if there is only a single freshman class this year, Dr. Poulos said he would like to develop two classes per grade (all four grades, 12 to 16 students in each) over the next few years. That, of course, means the facilities, which even Dr. Poulos admits are modest, will have to expand. With 7,000 square feet of space in the Old Hights Theater building, the chance to expand seems good.
"But if it really grows big enough, we’ll buy a building," Dr. Poulos said with a pragmatic smile. "You have to be flexible. This is just the beginning."
As for flexibility in the classroom, the students, Dr. Poulos said, will by 11th grade be past the more rigid "core courses" such as physical science and algebra and English composition, and into elective courses in either the science/math track or the humanities track.
And as for the students themselves, Dr. Poulos said, the handful already admitted range from the brilliant to the under-challenged. What they share, he said, is a need (and a want) to be more academically stimulated by their education.
Ultimately, Dr. Poulos said, SciCore’s strength will be judged on its adherence to not only its academic values but its practical ones. It not only will be what children take from books, he said, but what they take into their lives the values and ethics of knowledge, civic participation and healthy relationships with the world at large.
And in the end, he said, the quality of that education will come from how well the academy remembers another unofficial mantra: "Children are infinitely valuable."

