Located near to 1-95 in the City of Hallandale Beach, Lanier-James Education Center is one of Broward Public School Districts three disciplinary centers. Our facility is the oldest standing education site in the Northwest corridor of the City of Hallandale Beach. Formerly known as South Area Alternative Center, our name was officially changed by the School Board at the December 17, 2002 Regular School Board Meeting. Our school community voted to change the name in an attempt to restore some of the prominence and history of our city.

Our building opened in the early 1960’s as the second home to Lanier Junior High School, the junior high school designated for black children during school segregation. Once Lanier was re-purposed in the early 1970’s, it was the temporary home of Hallandale High School. When the current Hallandale High School facility was completed in the mid-1970’s, our school then became home to the B.F. James Adult Center.

Dr. Raphael O’Hara Lanier, a noted scholar and educational leader of his time, was the first president of Texas State University for Negroes (now Texas Southern University) and United States Minister to Liberia. Likewise, Benjamin Franklin James has been noted as a respected pioneer and educator in the City of Hallandale Beach. He was the first principal in the city. In fact, the first elementary school for black children in the City of Hallandale Beach bore his name. That building was razed in the mid-1970’s.

Once Hallandale Adult and Community Center opened as a full-time adult education facility in the mid-1980’s, our site became the disciplinary center for the southern part of the county. At any given time, our school serves approximately 200 students in Grades K-12 through one of our four distinct at-risk programs. Students must be assigned through administrative placement or school board action to participate in one of the three programs housed at our main campus. While our school is not a boundary, neighborhood school, our students on the main campus primarily reside south of State Road 84 (to the north) and as far south as the Broward/Miami-Dade County line. Our eastern and western boundaries are literally the ocean to the Everglades, respectively.

In accordance with their respective policy and/or statute guidelines, school bus transportation and free/reduced lunch programs are available. Academically, our students must meet the promotion and retention standards set forth in School Board Policy 6000.1. Individual Education Plans (IEP) and 504 Plans are implemented for students who are staffed/administratively placed at our school with a plan.