SCHSL approves two new charter schools as members, including one in Blythewood
Two more public charter schools will become members of the South Carolina High School League.
The league’s executive committee approved American Leadership of Blythewood and RISE Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute in Sumter for membership on Tuesday. Both schools will open this year and be at-large members the first year.
The schools can ask for full membership for the 2027-28 school year.
What to know about ALA Blythewood
This will be the second ALA school in the Midlands. ALA Lexington opened in 2023.
ALA Blythewood bought property last year along the U.S. Highway 21 that previously housed Policy Management Systems Corp., a long-defunct insurance technology company. The campus is located within Richland School District 2 and is close to district schools like Bethel-Hanberry Elementary School, Westwood High School and Blythewood High School. The school’s attendance zone for athletic purposes will be Blythewood High’s attendance zone.
ALA Blythewood will participate in these sports in the first year: cheerleading, volleyball, cross country, boys and girls basketball, wrestling, baseball, softball, boys and girls soccer, boys and girls track & field and boys and girls lacrosse. All sports will be junior varsity the first year except for basketball, which plans on playing a varsity schedule but won’t be eligible for the playoffs.
ALA Blythewood Upper School director Jared Strait said the school is looking for 1,040 students from 7-12 grade. Currently, there are 391 students scheduled to be enrolled with a majority in seventh and eighth grade.
Strait said on-campus facilities are being finished in anticipation of being used in the first year.
What to know about RISE Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute
RISE Entrepreneurial Leadership Institute initially asked for full-time membership but was only granted at-large status since regions and classes have been decided for next year.
RISE leadership said most of its students will come from Ragin Prep, a school in the South Carolina Independent Schools Association. But Ragin Prep will now be a kindergarten through fifth grade with RISE in the mix. Enrollment is 279 students right now with a maximum of 525 in the future.
Sports offered in the first year at RISE will be basketball, cross country, cheerleading, softball, baseball and track & field. Athletic director Anthony Jackson said the school will look to add football in 2027-28 school year.
All of RISE’s games will be played at Morris College in Sumter except for track and field, which will be played at a recreation facility in Sumter.
Smaller playoff field proposal passes
The SCHSL executive committee unanimously passed a proposal that would adjust the size of playoff fields and how schools qualify for the playoffs in each sport that is determined by a bracket.
“This proposal brings uniformity to our playoff brackets as much as we can create,” SCHSL associate commissioner Charlie Wentzky said.
Playoff brackets in most classifications this school year have featured 32 teams. Class 5A had 24 teams per bracket but was split into two divisions.
Under the proposal, the bracket sizes are:
Class 3A and 5A: There would be a minimum of 16 teams and a maximum of 24 teams, depending on the sport. There will be 35 total teams in Class 3A and 5A for the next two years.
Class 2A and 4A: There would be a minimum of 16 and a maximum of 28 teams. There are 45 teams in Class 4A and 44 in 2A, although not all schools play every sport.
The classification can decide how it wants to seed, if it wants to seed 1-24 or 1-28 or if it want to split it in Upper State and Lower State such as previous years.
Class A: This is the state’s largest classification for the next two years. If there are 65 or more schools participating in a sport, 48 teams qualify and two brackets will be considered. If there are 55-64 schools participating, 40 teams qualify and two brackets will be considered.
If there are 47-54 schools, 32 schools will qualify and two brackets will be considered. If there are no more than 46 schools, there will be up to one 24-team bracket. A 16-team bracket will be the minimum bracket size, and 32-team bracket will be the maximum number of teams in Class A.
The brackets will be built first from region champions and then second-place finishers in the region unless region sizes aren’t even. Byes are for the top-eight in a 24-team bracket. There will be no byes in a 28-team bracket. The MaxPreps RPI will determine the seeding of the region champs and runner-ups and then the rest of the playoff qualifier.
Under the proposal, there will be a streamlined process for all region tiebreakers using a points system. In the past, each region’s constitution would be responsible for determining the tiebreakers.
Also in the proposal, baseball and softball playoffs will have 24-team brackets. For baseball, the top-eight seeds get byes with seeds 9-24 playing a single-elimination game on the Monday of the first day of playoffs. The winners move on to best-of-three series, with a best-of-three format being used for the rest of the bracket and games played on Thursday-Saturday.
Softball brackets have four six-team districts.
“It was great work to align and have consistency across our system,” SCHSL executive committee president Adam Lanford said.
Four-quarter rule for football passes
The SCHSL executive committee voted 11-5 in favor of SC Football Coaches proposal for a four-quarter rule for high school football.
In the proposal, players can play in the first half of junior varsity games on Thursday and then the second half of the varsity contest Friday.
Head coaches and athletic directors are responsible for oversight, and penalties will be enforced if there are violations, according to the proposal. The first offense is a $500 fine and forfeiting the varsity game. Rulings cannot be appealed.
This is the second-straight year of the proposal, which wasn’t approved last year. Arguments were against it because of the enforcement, while those in favor said it helps smaller schools be able to play more players.
“I struggle to see how it helps any class,” SCHSL commissioner Jerome Singleton said.
Still, it passed after a stalemate during the discussion portion on Friday.
Search firm to be used in commissioner search
The SCHSL executive committee also approved the use of a search firm to help with finding the league’s next commissioner.
In March, it was announced Singleton’s tenure as commissioner would end no later than July 1, 2027, “pending the finding of an acceptable replacement.”
Now, the executive committee can begin the process of getting a search firm to help with new.
Also, Singleton announced the naming of the new executive committee for the 2026-27 school year. The committee is expanding to 23 members which will include two members each from SC Senate and SC House of Representatives. Those members haven’t been named yet.
But the rest of the committee will be made up of:
Superintendants: Randall Gary, Sheila Quinn, Cliff Jones, Shawn Foster, Harrison Goodwin
Principals: Gaye Driggers, Sam Fuller, Ashley Wardlaw, Robert Etheridge, Christina Snider
Athletic Directors: Todd Staley, Michael Anderson, Michael Pettit, Louie Alexander, Cody Brandyburg
Charter School Rep: Jimmy Armstrong; Private School Rep: David Padilla; Middle School Rep: Andy Rogers; State Dept Rep: Matthew Heirs
This story was originally published April 14, 2026 at 12:07 PM with the headline "SCHSL approves two new charter schools as members, including one in Blythewood."
