Tooele County’s first charter school will be led by a veteran educator who moved into the Tooele County School District last year.

The board of trustees for Excelsior Charter School has selected Ernie Nix as the school’s first director. Nix has been serving as the principal of East Elementary School in Tooele since the beginning of the current school year.

Excelsior, the first charter school approved in the county, is expected to open its doors this fall.

The charter school received 20 applications for the position of school director, according to Ann Gubler, chair of the school’s board of trustees. The board reviewed the applications and narrowed the field to three finalists who were interviewed.

“Nix was selected because he had experience at both the elementary and middle school levels, and his educational philosophy aligns with the mission of Excelsior School,” Gubler said.

As director, Nix will be the sole administrator for the school, functioning as principal and curriculum director. The school will not have an assistant principal. Nix’s first responsibility will be hiring teachers and staff.

Nix started his education career in 1989 after graduating from Western New Mexico University. He taught math and physics at the high school level in New Mexico for eight years while completing a master degree in educational management and leadership from New Mexico State University.

He moved to Utah in 1997 to become an assistant principal at Northwest Middle School in Salt Lake City, a position he held for three years before being named principal of Jackson Elementary School, also in Salt Lake City. After three years at Jackson Elementary, Nix became the principal of Glendale Middle School in Salt Lake City. He served at Glendale for five years before taking the job as principal at East Elementary last fall.

“My decision to accept this new position is in no way a reflection on the school or school district in Tooele,” Nix said. “I love the students and teachers here at East, but I could not pass up this opportunity to build an entire school from the ground up. It is a dream come true.”

Nix feels the charter school will give parents a choice in education.

“Our public schools do a good job here in Tooele,” Nix said. “However, a charter school offers several advantages — there is no bureaucracy at the district level, the curriculum is more focused, and we will be able to have caps on class size.”

Nix said there has never been a moment in his life when he wanted to be anything other than a teacher.

“I grew up in an impoverished home in El Paso, Texas. My father left the family when I was young, and my mother passed away from complications of alcoholism when I was in my early 20s,” Nix said. “It was my grandmother and teachers that made sure that I had clothes on my back, food to eat, and developed my character. I wanted to be a teacher to give back what they gave me.”

The state has capped enrollment at Excelsior School at 648 students, yet the school has received more than 1,000 intent-to-enroll forms already, according to Gubler. Nonetheless, slots are still open for students in grades seven and eight.

Gubler said Excelsior plans on opening with four, half-day kindergarten classes of 18 students each, and three classes each in grades one to eight with 24 students in each class.

Charter schools like Excelsior are publicly funded and do not charge tuition. They receive funding from the state and cannot discriminate in enrollment. Students for the opening year will be selected via a lottery system following state guidelines.

The school will accept intent to enroll forms from prospective students through Feb. 20. Parents will be notified of the results of the lottery by March 31 and have until April 30 to notify the school of their acceptance of the invitation to enroll.

Preference will be given in admissions to children of the founding members of the school. Founding member status is bestowed by the board of trustees and requires a parent to give 120 hours in service prior to the school’s opening and another 30 hours during the opening phase. State law limits founding members to 15 percent of the student enrollment. Preference will also be given to children of teachers at the school and siblings of students, according to Gubler.

The school has also announced a groundbreaking ceremony for its building on Jan. 31 at 10 a.m. The ceremony will be held at the building site on the southwest corner of SR-36 and Erda Way.

The building will be two stories and will have a total of 53,000 square feet of space. It will contain 27 traditional classrooms, an art room, science lab, computer lab, media center, lunchroom and gym, along with office space. The Excelsior School Board of Trustees has a $9 million contract with Peck Ormsby Construction of Lehi to build the school building following plans they have used to build several other charter schools throughout the state.

“We are excited to have Ernie Nix on board as director and to break ground on our building,” Gubler said.

Tim Gillie: tgillie@tooeletranscript.com