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NATCHEZ — This week and next are the last for those planning to enroll their students in a new Natchez charter school next year to do so.

Four different proposals for a charter school in Adams County were submitted to the Mississippi Charter School Authorization Board last year. However, Instant Impact Global Prep’s proposal was the only one approved in September 2022.

The new charter school is planned for the former Trinity Episcopal School campus, now Cornerstone Church at 319 U.S. 61 South. The location still requires approval from the Natchez Board of Aldermen.

However, there are already 100 students enrolled for school this fall, said Dr. JoAnn Rucker, Executive Director of the school called Instant Impact Global Prep.

“We have room and are looking for about 50 more,” Rucker said.

The school will accommodate students in kindergarten through second grade with plans to add an additional grade after each school year until eighth grade.

In February, the Natchez Planning Commission approved rezoning the Christian Hope Baptist Church, 301 LaSalle St., from R-1 residential to a Special Use District for the new school, however, that location was never finalized, Rucker said.

“We were still in negotiations at that point and had not finalized it but this location has been signed off on,” she said. “The Board of Aldermen still must approve and there is no reason why they wouldn’t.”

Instant Impact Global Prep is a STEAM—science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics—charter school run by the non-profit Instant Impact Educational Services, founded in 2018.

More information on Instant Impact Global Prep and applications can be found at instantimpactglobalprep.org.