LH school board approves several new programs
The Laurel Highlands School Board on Tuesday approved several grant-funded programs to add to the curriculum next school year. The board approved an adult mentoring program for high school students where students will be paired with an administrator, teacher or aide from within the district and a peer-mentoring program where 11th-grade students will mentor eighth-grade students while at the middle school and continue to as they move to ninth grade.
The latter program will eliminate the anxiety felt by some students entering high school for the first time, said Jim Tobal, chairman of the board’s curriculum committee.
The board also authorized administration to plan for an Air Force Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) program and approve a requirement for all ninth-grade students to select an academy from among several career-focused choices for grade 10. The district’s academy program was implemented last year and is modeled after curriculum offered by the National Academy Foundation. It includes programs such as information technology, hospitality and management and finance.
The board also approved articulation agreements with Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus, and Westmoreland Community College that will allow students to gain college credit in the schools’ mining technology and hospitality and tourism programs.
In other business, Dr. Ronald Sheba, superintendent, said after parents reported an incident where a bus was overloaded with elementary school students, the district investigated the issue and disciplined a district employee and a bus driver involved in the incident.
According to Sheba, the issue arose after Laidlaw Transit sent a substitute bus to George C. Marshall Elementary School for the Friday afternoon pick-up of students after another bus had a mechanical problem.
Sheba said while the bus was overcrowded, students were seated. The appropriate people involved still were disciplined for permitting the bus to exit the school with too many students inside, said Sheba.
“We are in the business of providing safe transportation to students and we don’t want to put anybody at risk, so we took the appropriate actions so this does not occur again,” Sheba said.
The board also tabled four school policies. Minor revisions were made to the district’s dress code, high school locker decorations, use of electronic devices by students and employees and the criteria for interviewing candidates for the substitute list policies.
Tobal, chairman of the board’s policy committee, said his committee had the policies approved by district administration, senior high student government, the solicitor and the school board, but public input is still welcome.
The board will consider adopting the policies, thereby making them a part of the student handbook at the April meeting. The district plans to post them on the Web site, www.lhsd.org
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Tobal said the dress code policy eliminates offensive and unsafe clothing, such as flip-flop sandals and body jewelry piercings except for earrings, while the locker policy will allow senior students to continue the tradition of decorating their lockers on the outside, but will eliminate gifts of candy given to upperclassman by their fellow students and stashed inside the lockers. The amount of candy inside some lockers is against the school’s wellness policy, said Tobal.
The electronic device policy bans students from carrying picture phones during school hours. Students will be advised to put phones in their locker until the school day ends, said Tobal. District employees, including teachers, are advised to turn off cell phones while in class, he added.
Tobal noted the policies are preventive measures intended to stop problems before they happen.
The revisions are part of the board reviewing all school policies.
The board also conducted the following business:
– Accepted the retirements of middle school technology education teacher Richard Bobincheck, middle school math teacher Elaine Wilson and Hatfield Elementary School fourth-grade teacher John Gibel. Each have 35 years of service with the district.
– Announced the district received permission from the state Department of Education to move back one week Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) testing because of the number of school days canceled because of the snow and cold.
– Authorized to seek bids for high school athletic field improvements, including a three-story press box, concession stand, restrooms, storage space and artificial turf for the field.
– Approved purchasing $4,887 in additional furniture for Hutchinson Elementary School, securing quotes for general liability, worker’s compensation and errors and omissions insurances from more than one broker and switching custodial cleaning supplies to 3M Twist and Fill, a more efficient product.