American Heritage Amends Break Even Goal

In order to , needed an enrollment of 164 students, parents said last week.

They set three tight deadlines, the first of which was this past Monday. Enrollment pledge forms were due by 9 a.m.

“If these conditions are not met,” the parent committee found, “American Heritage Academy will finish out the 2010/2011 school year and its contractual obligations, and then close its doors.”

American Heritage didn't get the 164 commitments, but the president of the board of directors said in a new letter to parents that it doesn't need that many.

"While initial break even estimates suggested we needed about 164 students," Scott Parrish wrote, "we’ve had some positive developments with respect to the build-out costs and we’ve been able to identify some additional cost saving measures that we believe would allow the school to move forward with as few as approximately 120 students."

As of Thursday, according to Parrish, the Sixes Road private school was just eight shy of that number.

"We are expecting to hear from 70 ... students soon, and in addition, we are aware of some students not currently at AHA who are interested in joining us for the upcoming school year," he wrote.

Click on the PDF on this page to read Parrish's letter, then check back with canton-ga.patch.com for updates on this developing story.