Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

PHS Holds Open House

Prescott High School held its annual public meeting and orientation for students and parents Monday, August 14, at 5:30 p.m. in the media center.

All faculty and staff members were introduced, especially the new additions to the facility.

New faces are the school include Kirk Armitage, head football coach; Jodie Cowart, girls' athletics; Sherry Chadwell and Jason Himes, special services; Cyndi Moorman, English, oral communications/tech writing and Wolf Trail advisor; Robert Fellows, band director; Dennis Pruitt, social studies; Linda Benton, family and consumer sciences; Frances Swift, business education; and Willie Wilson, social studies.

The following revisions of the 2000-2001 student handbook were presented: 1) a new state law that mandates specifically the steps/time line for the school to report that any person has committed or has threatened to commit an act of violence or any crime involving a deadly weapon on school property or while under school supervision; 2) a new state law concerning the procedure for removing students from classrooms for "unruly, disruptive, or abusive behavior that it seriously interferes with the teacher's ability to teach the students in the class or with the ability of the student's classmates to learn"; 3) book bags will be permitted at PHS provided they are of the clear plastic or open mesh variety; 4) the text exemption guidelines have an additional requisite in that "students must also have scored in the 75th or higher percentile in that subject or have raised their score to the next quartile on standardized tests in that subject as administered by ACTAAP or Benchmark test. total reading' score will be used in non-core courses not tested by ACTAAP. End of term exam in business/vocational courses may also be used'; 5) under Tardies' and Excessive Dentention Hall Assignments' to read that on the fifth assignment the "student will be suspended affective at the end of the school day until a parent conference is held (not to exceed five days) and that on the sixth assignment and thereafter, the student will serve three days in in-school suspension; 6) several minor consequences were re-worded to have "verbal reprimand" rather than d-hall assignment in order to fit with the district's new Behavior Action Plan, that stresses teaching appropriate behavior at the beginning, then handing out consequences if the inappropriate behavior continues.

Goals for school improvement were given centering on raising student's test scores in math, reading and ACTAAP tests; improving student behavior and responsibility; monitoring and improving the crisis plan; continued improvement of the career action plan; to continue offering workshop and other professional growth opportunities for the faculty; and to serve as adult representatives of self-control and problem-solving in a meaningful manner.

Faculty representatives from their respective departments delivered brief summaries of departmental successes and goals for the coming school year. This also included reports on programs such as accelerated reader/math, project wisdom, honor card program, core-plus mathematics project, the teacher's computer lab open for class use and the PHS website at www.myschoolonline.com/ar /curleywolf

"The faculty and staff of Prescott High School would like to thank the patrons and businesses of our community for their continued support," Ron Wright, superintendent of the district, said. "Our children are our future and it takes the total community to develop that future."