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<p>WILKES-BARRE &#8212; If you wanted transparency in public education, the new Wilkes-Barre office for Pennsylvania Cyber Charter has a great deal of it, literally.</p><p>The office sits in a corner space facing East Northampton and North Washington streets, and the exterior is more window than wall. Almost every step around the outside gives a wide view of the inside, an openness compounded by the fact that most of the inner partitions are also glass.</p><p>&#8220;We&#8217;re thrilled with it,&#8221; PA Cyber Executive Director Brian Hayden said as he waited for visitors at the location&#8217;s grand opening Wednesday. &#8220;It looks better than I expected from the floor plans.&#8221;</p><p>The entrance from Northampton leads to an all-glass foyer that, in turn, opens to a reception desk straight ahead and a large conference room, also walled off with glass, on the left. The conference room itself has a white board and large flat screen.</p><p>Across from that sits smaller spaces for activities and meetings that include two non-see-through walls intended for student art &#8212; some of which already hung on one side. There are a few booth-like seating areas, and an open space with a table on wheels that can also be used as a white board. Round discs perhaps half-a-foot-high sit around the table.</p><p>&#8220;These are stackable, so children can set them to their own size,&#8221; Hayden demonstrated, sitting on three stacked together.</p><p>Also as promised, there&#8217;s a large flex space with a partition &#8212; glass of course &#8212; that folds out of the way for two rooms or one. As a single room at the opening, it housed refreshments and showed off some of the technology PA Cyber makes available for visiting students, including pad computers, small programmable robots, and a virtual reality space that, wearing goggles, students have already used to &#8220;visit&#8221; places like Puerto Rico and Pittsburgh.</p><p>The center&#8217;s new director, Lauren Dennis, said it has been open for about two weeks and had walk-ins daily from people interested in what PA Cyber is all about. That&#8217;s one of the reasons the organization picked the spot, Hayden noted. It has already hosted events for students of the virtual school, who spend most of their time learning online at taxpayer expense. Cyber charters are public schools.</p><p>&#8220;We did community service, making scarves for the homeless,&#8221; Dennis said. &#8220;We had our winter blast party, with 38 students.&#8221; As the center ramps up, there are more events planned, including a showing of &#8220;The Polar Express&#8221; movie, a visit by instructors in martial arts and gymnastics, and a &#8220;dads for donuts&#8221; offering to entice fathers to the center.</p><p>PA Cyber has a goal of having enough such centers so that it is no more than a one-hour drive for any of the roughly 11,000 students statewide. Of those opened so far, Hayden said, &#8220;this is my favorite space.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Staff members leave the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School regional office at 40 E. Northampton St. in Wilkes-Barre during Wednesday&#8217;s grand opening. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/web1_TTL121318PAcyber_3-1-1-1.jpg</photo0><caption0>Staff members leave the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School regional office at 40 E. Northampton St. in Wilkes-Barre during Wednesday&#8217;s grand opening. </caption0><photoCredit0>Bill Tarutis | For Times Leader </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/web1_TTL121318PAcyber_2-1-1-1.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Four-year-old Levi Kozlansky, of Tunkhannock, shakes the wing of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School mascot Archie, named after the Greek mathematician Archimedes, as his mom Tara looks on at the grand opening of the school&#8217;s regional office in Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/web1_TTL121318PAcyber_2-1-1-1.jpg</photo1><caption1>Four-year-old Levi Kozlansky, of Tunkhannock, shakes the wing of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School mascot Archie, named after the Greek mathematician Archimedes, as his mom Tara looks on at the grand opening of the school&#8217;s regional office in Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday. </caption1><photoCredit1>Bill Tarutis | For Times Leader </photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/web1_TTL121318PAcyber_1-1-1-1.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Lauren Dennis, of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, cuts the ribbon with students at the grand opening for the school&#8217;s newest regional office at 40 E. Northampton St. in Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo2>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/web1_TTL121318PAcyber_1-1-1-1.jpg</photo2><caption2>Lauren Dennis, of the Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School, cuts the ribbon with students at the grand opening for the school&#8217;s newest regional office at 40 E. Northampton St. in Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday. </caption2><photoCredit2>Bill Tarutis | For Times Leader </photoCredit2></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Mark Guydish</p><p>mguydish@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Mark Guydish at 570-991-6112 or on Twitter @TLMarkGuydish</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Cyber school’s Wilkes-Barre location celebrates grand opening