BACK TO SCHOOL
Four districts resume classes
Four of Garland County’s seven public school districts — Cutter Morning Star, Fountain Lake, Lake Hamilton and Mountain Pine — started back to school Monday under the state’s school waiver law.
All seven districts signed a waiver this year that would allow the instructional year to start as early as Monday. Jessieville and Hot Springs school districts will begin Wednesday. Lakeside School District, which will return to classes Aug. 20, is the only public school district in the county that will not use the waiver.
According to Darin Beckwith, director of the Dawson Education Service Cooperative, state law established the Monday of the week containing Aug. 19 as the first allowable start date. With the waiver, he said, districts could set their own start date no earlier than Aug. 13 and no later than Aug. 26.
“One of the biggest benefits was going to be more instruction time before the semester tests,” Beckwith said. “There are other reasons, too; the instructional time was a big piece of that, but it will also level out and make the semesters more equal.”
Beckwith said that starting a week earlier allows for up to 86 days in the fall semester and 92 days in the spring semester, a difference of six days. Without the waiver, he said the fall semester would be around 81 days and the spring 97 days, a difference of 16 days.
“Going in, the tests are taken care of before the holiday,” Beckwith said of the added instruction days in the fall semester. “The other thing is (the waiver)
will pretty much ensure we’ll be out before the end of May.”
Malvern is the only other district of Dawson’s 22 member schools not utilizing the waiver.
Dana Janush, director of federal programs and public relations for Mountain Pine, said the first day went very well for first through 12thgrade students. Kindergartners will start the school year on Tuesday, she said.
Janush said Bobby Applegate, superintendent, had been making his rounds across the district and commented throughout the day how excited everyone has been to be back.
At Cutter Morning Star, Superintendent Nancy Anderson said there were lots of smiling faces and teachers glad to see their students Monday.
“It’s going great,” she said. “We’re very blessed that the rain held off and we were able to get everyone into the building, into their classrooms.”
Anderson said she believes the district’s enrollment numbers are up from last year, but those official counts won’t be available until after next week when all schools have returned.
Traffic, she said, was a little congested with parents walking their children to class and taking photos with their new teachers and the school’s sign.
“We never want to take that away from them,” she said. “We did have a lot of teachers and principals, and our school resource officer, out directing traffic, making sure it went smoothly. I think it will continue to get smoother as the week goes on. We appreciate everyone, our parents and patrons keeping our kids safe and being patient.”
At Lake Hamilton, Superintendent Steve Anderson said the first day was probably one of the smoothest starts to the school year he has seen in his time with the district.
“I was at the primary this morning and welcomed a lot of pre-K, kindergarten and first-graders, as well as their parents,” he said. “By 10 a.m., I had visited every building on campus. It was just a great start out in Wolf territory.”
He said there were some traffic backups, but those were to be expected, adding that Jeff Britt, director of support services, had already thought of some ways to address traffic issues on the north side of the Lake Hamilton campus.
Starting a week early, he said, made for a very short summer, but will hopefully prove beneficial in the long run.
“We sat back and watched at first and as we started hearing the majority of schools across the state asking for that waiver, we thought it would be a good idea,” he said. “Hopefully it will help us be able to wrap up school before June.”
Superintendent Michael Murphy said the rain throughout the day made for a few challenges at Fountain Lake, as many of the lower grades had to stay indoors for inside recess. Regardless, the day went off with no real issues.
“The kids are upbeat. The teachers are upbeat. There’s always a few that are not excited for summer to end, but overall it is going very well,” he said.
Murphy said he spent his morning in the primary building taking photos of every kindergarten student.
“That’s actually what I’m working on now, getting prints of these pictures to send home with a welcome to kindergarten letter,” he said. “That’s my goal, to get a picture sent back to every new kindergartner by the end of the first week of school.”
The district will continue its early dismissal days for students on Wednesdays at 2:15 p.m., he said.