Roadrunners take off at District One meeting

The Woodard Roadrunners ran away with the show at the Yuma Elementary School District board meeting Monday evening --_and there was no pesky coyote to stop them.

The junior high school, which teaches sixth-eighth graders, was the spotlight school for the month. District One has 17 elementary and middle schools within its boundaries.

Board members heard from student body president Matthew Davis and vice president Madison Wilkerson along with other students, teachers and administrators who showed videos, projects, speeches and interacted with the board.

“These are the real heroes of the district,” said Principal Danny Acosta in introducing students and teachers at Woodard. Board members were presented T-shirts that read “Be Your Own Hero.”

School counselor Jamie Baier talked to the board about the school’s “SEAL” program, which targets the whole child’s growth in social, emotional and academic learning, and is a school-wide project.

“Kids can’t learn if at home things aren’t going well or they are having different issues,” as their focus will be elsewhere, and not on what they are learning in class, she said.

Overall, the school has a lot to offer, Acosta said after the meeting, including its band, which is very active in playing around the county. Superintendent Jamie Sheldahl said District One is proud to offer music at all its schools.

Educating the whole child is a goal of the district, said Associate Superintendent Duane Sheppard, in his AZMerit report.

The board received an overview of how the district performed on the 2017 AZMerit test. The test, known as Arizona’s Measurement of Educational Readiness to Inform Teaching, is given to third through high school students.

The district’s third and fourthgraders surpassed the state average in math, Sheppard noted, and Alice Byrne, Rolle, Sunrise, Price, Otondo, Desert Mesa and Ron Watson were at or above the state average in proficiency.

Ron Watson is the top middle school in terms of points earned, Sheppard said.

Board members Barbara Foote and Irene Montoya gave reports on activities they had attended in the district, including the opening of O.C. Johnson as a community school.

CFO Denis Ponder gave an enrollment update, which he said he considered “positive.” Ponder noted that the district’s enrollment figures were still up from the first day of school.

As of the 60th day of school, which occurred in the first week of November, the district had roughly 8,198 students, Ponder said.

Number models and assumptions based on the first day and 60th-day counts predict that the district could see an increase of 300 students, he noted. That would increase the amount of funding from the state anywhere from about $600,000 to $1 million. Budget adjustments will be allowed in December.

Sheldahl read donations from the public to the district’s schools, including a clarinet and snare drum set (to the tune of $4,078); funds for field trips; and others. The total value of donations was $8,787.46.

The board’s next meeting will be at 5:30 p.m. Dec. 11.