Junction City School District
Updated play area awaits K-6 students; high school expands vocational options
The Junction City School District will welcome back students on Aug 16. According to superintendent Robby Lowe, students and families can anticipate a lot in the new school year.
Some of those changes include a new play area for grades K-6.
“The repurposed area is contained within a six foot chain link,” Lowe said. “The area has been graded to allow sufficient drainage. New sod covers the 1.2 acre play area and has automated irrigation to keep everything green. The large grass play area is bordered by 13 playground equipment areas that promote sensory learning and free play.”
This new play area will also have new security measures.
“A security vestibule is included along with a reconfiguration of the building office,” Lowe explained. “Automatic magnetic locks are being installed and the security camera system has been upgraded to eliminate many of the blind spots. This project will be completed before the start of school.”
The play area will be a new asset for the district; but something that will be returning are COVID-19 protocols and guidelines.
“As the pandemic shows no signs of going away anytime soon, we will follow the protocols and procedures set forth by the Arkansas Department of Health, the department of education and the state legislature,” Lowe said. “Our district strongly encourages all students and staff, aged 12 and up, to become vaccinated. We also strongly encourage social distancing, personal hygiene and masking when appropriate.”
As COVID numbers are back on the rise, the school district realizes that this has an impact on mental health, which is why the district will continue a program it started last year.
“The district now employs a certified licensed professional mental health counselor to help address childhood mental health disorders,” Lowe said. “Either of our school counselors can aid parents in getting their children needed professional counseling. With this program, we are not at the mercy of outside agencies to get these children the help they need.”
Also, the district is better prepared to teach virtually if schools are made to go back to virtual learning primarily.
“We also have developed an Arkansas State Board of Education approved digital learning program. Dragon Virtual School recruited participants during the summer,” Lowe explained. “Each campus has a designated virtual learning coordinator to act as a point of contact for parents and students. Should the pandemic force virtual education, we are much better prepared to meet those challenges this year.”
The high school has some new programs they can look forward to as well.
“In the high school we are aggressively expanding our vocational programs in the three areas,” Lowe said. “Business management, agriculture (emphasis on construction technology and mechanics) and family and consumer science. We expect to offer culinary arts as a program of study by Fall 2023 to go along with other family and consumer science programs.”
Helping out with a lot of these programs will be the host of new teachers that will be joining the district this year.
“With the infusion of federal money at the local level, we have restructured many of our learning programs to accelerate learning loss due to the pandemic,” Lowe shared.
“We have hired a literacy coordinator and several certified literacy and math interventionists who are in the process of analyzing data from spring testing to find our instructional and student learning gaps,” he continued. “As deficiencies are identified, each student with a learning gap will receive small group or individual help to accelerate the recovery of lost learning.”
School board meetings this year will be held on the second Tuesday of each month. School board members for the 2021/2022 school year include Jay Green, President; David Barnette, Vice President; Billy Smith, Secretary/ Treasurer; and members Eddie Bryan and Paul Kugler.
“If there is one message we can convey to the community, it is that the administration and faculty are always willing to hear parents’ concerns, and we openly invite parents to come in or call,” Lowe said. “Parent engagement is powerful. We ask parents to have high expectations for the school just as our school has high expectations for all students.”