As the clock ticks down to the start of school on Aug. 1, the Greene County Board of Education heard good things about summer school this year.
At its July 21 meeting, the principals of the three main schools told the board that even though summer school is designed to help students achieve grade-level proficiency, every student was invited to participate.
“Attendance was much better with summer school than it was in any of our intersessions,” said Greene County Primary School Principal Ashlie Miller.
Intersessions are special catch-up classes that have been held during traditional breaks in the schedule.
Miller reported that 176 students signed up and the average attendance was about 130. The third-grade teachers were very involved in urging participation and that grade averaged 56 children every day.
Thirty-three students from grade three who scored low on the end-of-year Milestones test were able to retake the exam, hoping to raise their scores enough to not be held back from fourth grade. In response to a question from BOE Chairman Mike Lynch, Miller said the GCPS is maintaining increasingly higher standards, but she is not going to retain a child more than one time in primary school.
DeAndra Lanier, principal of Carson Middle School, said there were 75 to 80 students from grades four through seven, and this summer they focused on critical thinking and literacy beyond the child’s grade level. Thirty-two students retested in reading, and 34 retested in mathematics.
New Greene County High School Principal Eddie Hood said 54 students participated in summer school as a way to recover credits toward graduation. The eighth-grade group had the best participation. Usually, he said, the older the kids get, the more difficult it is to get them to attend summer school.
Miller said she thinks that the NWEA tests students take at the beginning of the school year will show that summer school is beneficial.
“We ramped it up, even more, this year,” she said.
Superintendent Chris Houston said that intersessions may be going away.
“When we have the intersessions and summer school,” Houston said, “I think at this point, we’re seeing it dilute all of the opportunities, so we’re allowing the students to have their breaks during intersessions which would be your fall break, your spring break and then have a stronger push for summer school.”
Also at the Board of Education meeting:
• Chairman Lynch asked Superintendent Houston to put together a report on how well the various programs for parents are being received, saying that parental involvement “is so important.”
• School District Construction Manager Ralph Boswell said the demolition of the old Greensboro Elementary school building is past the scheduled completion date. That’s because of the discovery of more asbestos and the difficulty in transporting some items to special, distant landfills. He said the contractor has set a revised completion date of Aug. 31.
• Two out-of-state field trips were approved. One will involve Carson Middle School (CMS) and Greene County High School students traveling to Indiana for a Future Farmers of America (FFA) convention. The other will be to Florida for CMS students.
• Lynch told the Lake Oconee News, after the meeting, that the BOE is sending the Lake Oconee Academy Board of Governors another revised proposal, hoping to end LOA’s lawsuit against the BOE over student funding. “It’s something that moves closer to their position and is a good offer,” Lynch said.