Apr 23, 2003 By April Straughters 4 min read

BROWNSVILLE – Students in the Brownsville Area School District apparently are not clear on what they need to do in order to graduate high school, a school board member said Tuesday. According to director Stella Broadwater, eight seniors dropped out of school because they found out they did not meet district or state requirements to earn their diploma.

A number of the students returned to school after school officials contacted them, Broadwater said, adding that she is working with one student to get him back into the classroom.

Broadwater said the students found out their senior year that they would not be able to graduate because of either failing scores on the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment tests in their junior years or insufficient numbers of community service hours or class credits.

According to Broadwater, the state requires a senior to have 65 hours of community service to graduate. She said seniors also are required to pass the PSSA in their junior year or pass a retest in their senior year or an equivalent test offered by the state.

Broadwater said many students are not aware of the community service requirements or that they can retake the PSSAs or a district equivalent test.

“We need to have an education meeting and hold the administrators accountable and relieve the stress off of these kids. There are a lot of misunderstandings. This should fall on the administrators to see if they are graduating. You cannot tell a senior this late in his senior year that he is not graduating,” Broadwater said.

President Rocky Brashear and directors Andy Dorsey and Francine Pavone all agreed.

“I feel these kids are being held hostage, and I feel bad for them, because we can’t help them in April,” Pavone said.

Dorsey said he does not believe the district is passing the proper information outlining what is required for graduation on to the students. He suggested that the district have an assembly for all eighth-grade students, explaining what is required of them to graduate.

Director Dr. Melvin Sally, chairman of the education committee, said he will schedule a committee meeting soon to review the school policy on graduation.

In other business, Broadwater asked the board to reconsider a board decision requiring the district’s golf coach pay $435 for new shirts for the golf team.

According to Brashear, the board decided to take the cost for the shirts out of the coach’s salary after he purchased the shirts without a purchase order.

Broadwater said it is not fair to have the coach pay for the shirts out of his salary.

“Those shirts were garbage. We are cheating our students. …The bottom line is we’re either for the kids or we’re not,” Broadwater said, adding that she would advise the coach to quit his coaching position before purchasing the shirts with his own money.

Brashear was angry with Broadwater’s comments.

“You are the only board member that never has anything good to say about the district or this board … and I’m not putting up with it as board president. We’ve been in the red and purchased equipment. We never short change our students or compromise their safety,” he said.

Brashear said the coach was told the proper procedure for ordering uniforms and that he should have followed those instructions.

“My problem is following directions. It’s his fault that he purchased the shirts without board approval,” Brashear said, adding that he is friends with the golf coach but that “policy is policy.

“We cannot allow employees to purchase anything they want.”

Brashear said that every January coaches are given a requisition to purchase what they need for their teams.

He said the problem is that the coaches don’t turn the requisitions in and the district often ends up paying more for the items than they would had the items been ordered at the proper time.

In other business, the board agreed to hold a budget meeting Thursday, May 8, at 7 p.m.