5/24/2012 - West Side Leader
     

Plus, high school undergoing schedule changes

There won’t be any more budget cuts to the Woodridge Local Schools before the Aug. 7 election. That was the pledge of the Woodridge Board of Education at its May 15 meeting.

The board took the final vote to put a five-year emergency levy on the August ballot at a special meeting May 1. If passed, the 6.83-mill levy would bring in $3 million per year for the district.

Planning for the levy campaign is under way, according to Superintendent Walter Davis. School board members, staff and administrators will work with community volunteers. Anyone interested in helping with the campaign is asked to call the superintendent’s office at 330-928-9074 or contact any board member.

In other business, Woodridge High School Principal Joel Morgan outlined numerous changes that are coming to the high school.

Enrollment next fall will be “at capacity,” Morgan said, with the ninth- and 11th-grade classes especially large. The current two lunch periods will not accommodate that many students in the cafeteria, so they are adding a third lunch period, he said.

To fit in a third lunch period, they will eliminate the 30-minute Academy period, he said.

There will be nine class periods in the school day. Study hall monitors were lost to the budget cuts, Morgan said, so the teachers will have a duty period for study halls.

During each period’s study hall, there will be a “learning center” in the auditeria next door, with teachers available to help students with their studies or to provide enrichment activities.

Morgan said he was excited about the intervention and enrichment that will be made possible by the schedule changes.

In addition, the high school day will be nine minutes longer. The school board approved a resolution to change the starting time to 7:40 a.m. and ending time to 2:36 p.m. The middle school will begin at 7:30 a.m. and let out at 2:27 p.m., also nine minutes longer than the current day.

Morgan and Middle School Principal Jesse Hosford explained students who arrive to school by bus have some time to kill before school starts in the morning, so the school officials decided to start a few minutes earlier to convert those minutes to instruction time.

The two schools share bus runs, Davis said. Those riding the bus will not have their schedules change; the students who are dropped off at school will need to come a few minutes earlier, he said.

The schedule changes will not affect the primary and intermediate schools, he added.

Davis announced all of the high school seniors passed the mandatory Ohio Graduation Test, so “none of them will have to sit out commencement.”

“We’re very proud of these kids, the middle and high school staff, parents and all who support our kids,” he said.

Davis also started monthly “Coffee with the Superintendent” sessions. These are open sessions with no agenda, when anyone — parents, staff and community members — may come, have a cup of coffee and just chat or ask questions. The next one will be held June 1 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at the Administration Building, 4411 Quick Road.

The school board’s next regular meeting is scheduled for June 19 at 6 p.m. at the Administration Building.

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