By Jamie M. Dobbs
The October Bryant School Board meeting began with a new board president and vice president being nominated and elected. Previous president Rhonda Sanders was nominated and elected as vice president while Sandra Porter was nominated and elected as president. The secretary and disbursement officer were also voted on with David Moore continuing to hold both positions.[more]
School Improvement updates were the highlight of the meeting with Bryant Middle School principal Sue Reeves, Bethel Middle School principal Todd Sellers, and Bryant Elementary principal Dean Burbank present to speak about their continued attempts at getting out of School Improvement designation. Those three schools have been placed in School Improvement by the State Department of Education, due to their low test scores in certain sub populations of their school’s overall demographic.
Reeves told the board of remedies that have been put into play at Bryant Middle School. Before and after school tutoring has started, to assist those students who need to improve their test scores, double block classes to give students the opportunity to have extra time in the classes that they struggle in and a 20-minute advisory period at the end of the day to aid students in literacy and math.
Sellers spoke to the board about some solutions that are taking place at Bethel Middle School. Early morning remediation, Read 180, double blocking, reading enrichment and an advisory period have been initiated to help the students that are below proficient on their test scores raise their marks. Bethel is in year three of School Improvement.
Burbank followed up with explaining Bryant Elementary’s efforts and he also voiced concern about certain sub populations, such as free and reduced lunch as well as the African Americans, growing and becoming an issue as far as testing goes. Bryant Elementary is currently not participating in before and after school tutoring but they are double blocking, having math and literacy work done with students one-on-one, having round table discussions with teachers, and following attendance of students very closely. All of the above schools are planning on getting out of School Improvement in the next few years.
Brittany Jones, Bryant High School Student Senate president, was present to give the Student Senate Report. According to Jones, “homecoming went smoothly and came out great.” She thanked all of the teachers and those in the community that helped with the event and went on to say that the Senate is now working on Senior Night. She added that the group’s community project for the month is volunteering at “Our House.”
A new science lab has recently been opened at Davis Elementary and teacher Donna Peters was present to share information about the success of the lab so far. She passionately expressed that the lab is being used daily and it is giving the kids the ability to take science to the next level with experiments and projects they are capable of doing now that the lab is open. Peters has plans to start a longitudinal study in August of 2011 to further utilize the lab.
Other items on the agenda included copy machine leases that have come due with Arkansas Copier. In the past, the district has had all of its copiers on the same leasing schedule. Due to the addition of new machines, most of the copier leases have come due at different times. For convenience, the board voted to have Randal Thompson, from Arkansas Copier, place all of the copiers on the same leasing schedule saving the district $7,100.
Don McGohan, assistant superintendent, discussed bids that were received for a janitorial service to clean Springhill Elementary, Hurricane Creek Elementary and Bethel Middle School. The bids came back with Clean Team Janitorial, Inc., significantly lower than the competition. The board voted and approved Clean Team Janitorial, Inc., to begin a cleaning contract on Nov. 1 for the three schools.
Bids were also sent out on the ornamental fence for Hurricane Creek Elementary. Little Rock Landscape, Inc., came back with the lowest bid and the board voted to award it the job. Hurricane Creek PTO has agreed to pay $6,000 of the fencing so only the remainder will be the district’s responsibility.
Construction throughout the district has continued along smoothly according to Brooks Jackson, of JBK Architects. The facilities that were completed throughout the summer did not cost as much as initially anticipated so the district will be receiving $68,000 back from the jobs that were completed.
