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Large Turnout at HSD Board Meeting;

                                           By Jeremy Thomas

Hazelwood School Board meeting last week saw a huge community turnout as the board room had standing room only. There were several reasons why the meeting was well attended, included the fact that the interim tag for  Grayling Tobias was lifted as he is now the permanent superintendent.

The audience as well as board members gave Dr. Tobias a standing ovation when he was announced the superintendent. “I am just truly blessed and honor to be able to take on this leadership position, I will continue to work hard with my board to make sure we develop success in the district, and provide assistance to our residents,” Tobias said in a statement.

Tobias presented a slide show presentation in which he talked about the many different events he has intended over the past two months. The most recent ones were his

attendance at all three Hazelwood high schools Homecoming games, along with several Homecoming festivities. He also made appearance around the North County area during Veteran’s Day to attendant several events.

   The other big headline for the meeting was the recognition for the Emerson Excellence in Teaching Award winners.The Emerson Excellence in Teaching Awards program recognizes outstanding examples of educational excellence. It also serves to express collective admiration and gratitude for the dedicated individuals who strive to teach children. There were a total of 18 middle schools in the north county area in which notable teachers represented. There were also 6 secondary schools in the north county area that notable teachers represented.

Emerson Teaching Awards

     The 2012 Emerson Excellence in teaching the awards included two HSD teachers: Schahrazad Mahnane, a teacher who teaches French at Hazelwood West High School and Scott Kratzer who teaches fifth grade at Garrett Elementary,   continued on page   A video was shown of them receiving their award along with a fruit basket at their respective schools. The teachers at the meeting responded with a standing ovation.

Other topics during the meeting included an update for the Assessment Literacy strategy. Cystal Reiter provided a presentation which mentioned methods schools are implementing to try to have students read at the proper level. Currently there are  middle schools students reading at  levels lower than what they should be. One of the strategies mentioned in the presentation was to supply tutors, along with learning activities to make the students

want   to read more books at a higher grade level.

ACT Report Presented

   There was also a presentation an ACT plan report which  Darrell Strong and a few others talked about. The power point showed the numbers of sophomores, juniors, and

seniors from all three Hazelwood schools who took the ACT over the past year, and the averages between each class. Surprising the highest scores among all three classes and at all three schools were the sophomore’s scores, which were almost 4 points better than Juniors and Seniors.

However the reason might because sophomore’s had the smallest class size sample, while juniors and seniors had the largest class size numbers of those taking  the ACT. The presentation mentioned that the Hazelwood Schools as well as area high schools are pushing for students to enroll in the ACT prep course.

The course will allow students to get familiar with taking the ACT and building on their weak areas of the test.

“We want students to do well on the ACT, by enrolling in the prep course. It allows students a better chance at scoring high on the actual test. Student should take the ACT early and often,” Strong said in a statement. When the meeting wraps up usually patrons are giving the chance to voice their opinion about any issue but no resident asked any questions.