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Vail Christian High School will stay open

auren Glendenning
lglendenning@vaildaily.com
Vail, CO Colorado

VAIL VALLEY, Colorado – Vail Christian High School students and parents who were worried about what to do for the 2010-11 school year can worry no more – the school will remain open.

Thanks to an anonymous donor who pledged a 7-figure donation to help save the school, along with other gifts and donations from the community, the valley’s only Christian high school does not have to close its doors this year as school officials had recently announced.

Gary and Patti Carlson were planning to move back to Florida when they learned they wouldn’t be able to send their daughter, Allison, back to Vail Christian next year. The couple would have moved in order to send their daughter to a Christian high school, so the news is especially great for them.



“We were ecstatic to hear the news and so thankful for God’s hand in all this,” Patti Carlson said Thursday. “We are thrilled for the leadership of both Randy Lowe and Jeremy Lowe.”

Allison is a freshman and was home-schooled until starting school at Vail Christian last fall.

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Allison said she was at school Thursday when some other students were running around announcing the school had been saved. “I was just so relieved that we weren’t going to have to move to Florida,” Allison said.

The school’s board of directors were in New York Thursday when they reached an agreement with the bond holders to repurchase the $12 million in bonds on the school.

Buying back the debt secures the school’s long-term survival, Randy Lowe, the school’s chairman of the board, said Thursday.

“We’re open from here on out,” Lowe said. “This eliminated our indebtedness. I think Vail Christian High School will be open for years to come.”

School officials believe they’ll be able to retain about 90 percent of the school’s students and teachers for the 2010-11 school year, according to a statement released Thursday.

For parents like the Carlsons, a Christian education is too important to their family values to let go of it so easily.

Jeremy Lowe, the school’s headmaster, said the news is a huge relief. He said the school will announce some exciting new academic programs next week.

The school will make a formal announcement Friday about its ongoing schedule of open houses planned for current and new students and new programs that will begin next school year.

Randy Lowe was overwhelmed with excitement Thursday as he boarded a plane in New York to head back home.

“We’re unbelievably touched by the fact we’re able to take out the school’s indebtedness and secure the school’s future,” Randy Lowe said. “I’m stunned at the amount of community support and donor support – it’s truly affirming and heartening.”

Community Editor Lauren Glendenning can be reached at 970-748-2983 or lglendenning@vaildaily.com.


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