What a wonderful break from the winter weather January has been! We have plenty of winter remaining and I am sure we will be digging out the shovels many more times, but the days are getting longer and spring will be here before we know it.
December was a long month with all the weather days we had to take. It just seemed that the wind and snow would never let up. It is always my philosophy that student safety is my primary concern when making the decision to have school in session or not. Unfortunately, with the days missing, we will need to use a couple of our built-in snow days. School will be in session on February 20th and May 12th. We were able to use a couple of days as virtual learning and that went as well as can be expected. We knew that a storm was coming, and we were able to prepare for a couple of days of virtual learning. This is not something we like to implement, but it can be a way to offer educational opportunities during weather events. We also realize that during these storms, many students are needed to help on the ranches. When we go virtual, we will always understand the circumstances some families are dealing with and will work with those families to make sure we are not adding to their stress levels.
Scranton Public School has been one busy place. Winter extra-curricular activities are in full swing, and our winter athletic seasons have passed the half-way mark. Our students are on the road quite often, but their focus remains in the classroom. Our teachers are preparing engaging lessons and it is exciting to see the creativity of both students and staff.
On January 16, we had a teacher in-service day. At the elementary end, the staff took the time to scaffold and review our math curriculum. We wanted to go through our priority standards and make sure we did not have any gaps from grade level to grade level. The high school used the day to plan a project-based learning opportunity for our students. Our students will be working cross curricular on an individualized post-secondary plan project later this semester. I am excited to see how this comes together as it will be a great project for our secondary students.
Our Title I program is under review this year and our self-monitoring materials have been submitted. This program deals with our federal money that we receive for our interventions in reading instruction. This audit occurs every five years and this was our year for review. We have a strong Title program and hopefully this audit will result in an opportunity to even make the program stronger.
Our legislature is in full session as we speak. There will be many bills that will be brought forward that will have a major impact on our school. One is House Bill 1251. This bill limits the ability of small schools of less than 475 students to employ their own superintendent and limits compensation for superintendents. In my opinion, this bill at its core is a push towards consolidating small schools. It insinuates that our rural elected officials cannot be trusted to make the decisions that are in the best interest of our communities. It is an attack on our local control and another attempt to micromanage small schools from the executive branch. I have communicated with our local legislators, and they oppose this bill too.
Senate Bill 2338 is a bill that I have communicated my support for with the Senate Education Committee. This bill would expand the definition of what constitutes an isolated school district to include school districts that have fewer than 200 students whose land mass is greater than 400 square miles. If passed this bill would result in a few more dollars being added to our state’s per-pupil payment. There have been many bills that have resulted in dollars being moved from small districts to larger districts, so it is nice to see a bill brought forward that can help maintain the effectiveness of our smaller rural districts.
The school year is flying by, and we continue daily to improve the educational experience for our students. On behalf of our students and staff, I want to thank our community for all the support. It takes a village to raise our children, and there is no better village than the community of Scranton! Go Night Hawks!
Kelly Pierce
Superintendent