ELKINS — Officials are working at three local schools to make sure a new program is working for the students.

Just last month Gov. Jim Justice and First Lady Cathy Justice announced that three Randolph County Schools would be participating in the state’s Communities in School program.

With the new school year now in its second week, the program is off and running with site coordinators stationed at the three different locations — Elkins High School, Elkins Middle School and Beverly Elementary School.

“The program starts out at feeder schools,” Schell Hopwood, who is the Family and Community Engagement Specialists for Randolph County Schools and the county contact for the CIS program, told The Inter-Mountain Monday. “So the program has to involve an elementary school, middle school and high school.”

Mark Rosencrace at EHS, Amanda Nucilli at EMS, and Janetta Ross at BES are the program coordinators who will be in the schools helping students with whatever needs may arise.

“The site coordinators’ jobs are to connect with the students and families, and to work with school staff to provide support with whatever needs the students may have,” Hopwood said. “Whether it’s academic or basic needs, the coordinators are there to provide support. They are there to help direct them to resources or services, either in the county or within the school.

“The coordinators work closely with the counselors, social workers and the staff at each one of those schools. They can work with all students in the school, or individual students based on more needs.”

Hopwood said the program coordinators will allow employees at the school to have more time focusing on their tasks at hand.

“The purpose is to try and free up some of the staff at the schools,” Hopwood said. “The school employees can focus on what they need to do, while the site coordinators can spend time getting to know the kids and their families — helping them with the things they need to be successful in school.”

The goal of the program is to connect students to caring adults and community resources to transform how they see and experience the world around them. It is designed to help students achieve success and take charge of their future with the goal of keeping them in school and ultimately graduating.

“The program is set up to have a strong collaboration with community agencies and the things that are available,” Hopwood said. “We are super excited about this program. Hopefully we will be able to reach kids that need support and get them on track to be successful.”

Other than the three schools in Randolph County, 12 other new schools in West Virginia were recently selected to take part in the program. Those schools are located in Logan, Marshall, Monroe and Ohio counties. A total of 186 schools across the state are now participating in CIN. All together there are 26 states, including Washington, D.C., taking part in the education initiative.

“This program is highly recommended on a national level,” Hopwood said. “They are hoping to see it grow and be more available in the future. West Virginia kind of has the model program and other states are looking to us to see how they are going to implement it. It is nice to know that we are kind of leading the path that other states are looking at.”