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Board, Public Hear Reports on Hazelwood ‘Walk Through’ at Schools, Principal Reports
By Jeremy Thomas
The recent Hazelwood School Board meeting had once again a large turnout of as the board room was full to the maximum with standing room only. The residents seemed eager to here update from Superintendent Grayling Tobias on what had done around the district this winter.Tobias talked about several events he recently attended along with several different things the board wants to do more of in the coming year. In a lengthy slide show Tobias mentioned and showed members of the board and himself at numerous elementary schools in the district, performing what he is calling “Walk throughs”. “We want to make ourselves more visible and prevalent in our area schools, and show that we value and appreciate all that our teachers, Principals, and staff members are doing,” Tobias said.
One of the more interesting events that Tobias, the board, and several administrators from local schools attended was the National Alliance for Black school educators. The event was the 40th annual conference for the non-profit organization, Tobias and company got the rare chance to meet the original “freedom writers.”
Many district patrons were there for the report of six different school principals who presented end of the semester reports, along with long and short term goals.
The following principals provided PowerPoint presentations: Rhonda Ely from Larimore Elementary, Lois Taylor from Townsend Elementary, Chauncey Granger from Southeast Middle school, Gary Jansen, from East Middle School, Yolander Pittman from Central Middle school, and Jacqueline Kelly, from East High School. Each principal had a nice group of parents and staff who they acknowledged at the end of their presentation. All were met with applause.
Each presentation was different, but there appeared to be a central theme that all the presentation had—that being education progress. Each PowerPoint incorporated what the principals called the ABC’s which were “Attendance, Behavior, and Classroom-work”. The principals provided a detailed analysis of their school as a whole regarding the three main category groups.
Most of the elementary schools showed excellent attendance numbers, with up and down classroom-work numbers. The lone high school principal at the meeting, Jacqueline Kelly, in her PowerPoint presentation described her school as lacking in attendance, and far too many discipline behavior incidents . However she did say that to motivate students to perform great in the classroom, she has provided extra after school academic programs for students to take advantage, at no charge to parents.
