Master plan is a work in progress

Molly Shore

More computers in classrooms, after-school intervention programs to

help students raise their grades, fund-raising by parent groups, and

partnerships with the business community are some of the goals

achieved in the school district’s Strategic Master Plan for the

2002-03 school year.

At Thursday evening’s Board of Education meeting, board members

were presented with a list of accomplishments throughout the district

last year.

Alexis Sheehy, assistant superintendent for instructional

services, reported on many of the achievements of the master plan, a

document implemented in the 1997-98 school year and updated every

year.

“These are not necessarily the outstanding achievements of the

schools, but rather the totality of the schools’ achievements,”

Sheehy said shortly before the start of the meeting.

Addressing the board, Sheehy listed key activities in eight goal

areas, including curriculum and instruction, qualified staff,

facilities and safe schools, family partnerships, technology,

communication, business and community, and funding and resources.

At Miller Elementary School, the school’s booster club sponsored

the first trip of 140 fifth-graders to last year’s Outdoor Science

School.

Seven permanent classrooms were added to the Walt Disney

Elementary School campus, and at Thomas Edison Elementary School,

employees of the Walt Disney Co. volunteered as tutors in the

school’s second-grade reading program.

At Emerson Elementary School, funding from API award money

supplied a new copier and reading materials for the school, Sheehy

said.

Upper-grade students at Bret Harte Elementary School were trained

as technology tutors, and at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School, the

bi-monthly Patriot Press has kept parents informed of school

activities.

School board member Dave Kemp said the accomplishments in all the

areas go a long way toward achieving the district’s goals.

“I want to give the teachers credit for all the work they do, and

the administration leadership is also important. They have to do the

monitoring and reporting,” Kemp said after the meeting.

Without the plan, Supt. Gregory Bowman said the district would

have only test scores to rely on, and it would be denied a

comprehensive view of achievements at all schools.

“The Strategic Master Plan has become a holistic reporting

process,” he said. “It gives anecdotal information about our fine

schools.”