For several years, the Alternate Learning and Career Center East has been located in the Unit 2 space of the Lutheran Homes Society's nursing home at the corner of Seaman and Wheeling streets in east Toledo, Ohio. This school is operated as a tandem effort beteen Lucas County and LHS Family & Youth Services, with the County overseeing admission to the school, providing the teachers and setting the curriculum. LHS contributes an Educational Coordinator and teacher aides. The facility has a successful track record of providing appropriate educational and behavioral services to behaviorally challenged children and youth, who come from both from LHS treatment facilities and the community at large.

Prior to locating in the Unit 2 wing of the nursing home, the school was operated on the premesis of one of the LHS group homes on Wynn Road. When the success of this program necessitated more space, Unit 2 was renovated into classroom space. Once again, a successful venture has borne fruit and creating room for expansion is imperative.

For a number of years, Lutheran Homes Society has owned the property on the south-western corner of Wheeling and Seaman streets, upon which sat a farm house and barn. Only recently was the farmhouse vacated and torn down, with the barn being the only remaining vestage of a once active agricultural venture. Local historians have dated the construction of the barn at around 1860.

It is on this site that LHS Family & Youth Services is overseeing the construction of the new facilities for ALCC East. In fact, not only will this be a new school, but practically a whole new breed of buidling. Harry L. Blackmon, MS, LPC, the Executive Director of LHS Family & Youth Services, recently explained to this writer that the building will incorporate the latest in "green" technology, surpassing the requirements of Federal guidelines and setting a new precedent for energy conservation and efficiency. Many of the building materials are manufactured from recycled matierials, and much of the lighting will be natural light through skylights in the ceilings. Heating and cooling will be provided by energy efficient heat pump technology. As news of this project has spread, it has drawn the interest of "green" advocates from around the nation.

One of the more unique features of this facility will be the incorporation of the "old" with the "new." Mr. Blackmon pointed out to this writer that the construction plans include using the original 1860 barn structure as the cafeteria space! The structure as it sits now on the property will be picked up and moved about 100 feet, and repositioned to be alligned with the new construction. Of course, the structure will need to be "de-fested" of the elements that characteristically make a barn a "barn" (i.e., rodents, birds, manure, dust, mold, etc.), and then the wooden beams will be properly sealed and preserved. While the outside of the barn will be fully and covered with a facade similar to the rest of the building, the interior will display the rustic wooden beams exposed in all their historic splendor.

If this technique rings a familiar bell with the reader, it may be because the reader has previously eaten at The Barn restaurant, outside of Archbold, Ohio, near the historic Sauder Village Museum. Many years ago, industrialist/philanthropist/historian Erie Sauder moved an entire barn, structurally intact, across fields and byways of eastern Indiana and northwestern Ohio to the present location, sat it down on a new foundation and embued it with culinary purpose. In a similar fashion, Mr. Blackmon and Lucas County will be embuing the1860's relic at the corner of Seaman and Wheeling with both academic and therapeutic purpose.