Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Gymnsastic building completed

Gurdon Superintendent Bobby Smithson reported on the new cheerleading/gymnastics building at the March 19 meeting of the Gurdon School Board.

"The facility has been completed. We moved the cheerleaders into the room on Monday, February 4", said Smithson. He also told school board members the total cost of the project was $41,480.00, which came to $26 per square foot.

A grant request for $36,000 has been denied. The money was to be used to renovate the vocational building and use the facility to educate the children living at the Therapeutic Family Services center.

Smithson said, "There was approximately $8 million available for the whole state at the eligible school districts. I believe the overall status of our buildings hurt our chances because most districts have older buildings. I had hoped our efforts to serve IDEA students would place us in a more favorable position."

Smithson said he planned to continue the program located at the therapeutic center because the students need an education, but some are not able to handle the regular school environment.

However, the district did receive a grant to update the computer lab at Cabe Middle School. The grant is in the amount of $69,000.

Smithson commended the high school assistant principal, Charles Failla, for writing the grant and working on awarding bids for the purchase of the new equipment and software.

Failla said he had already ordered new software that covers the basic subject areas and is suitable for K-12. He also said he was taking in bids.

"I originally estimated the amount of each computer to cost around $800 per computer. The cheapest bid given so far has been $659," Failla said.

Failla said he was expecting to have new computers in a couple of weeks.

The Gurdon School Board also expressed the action it has taken in order to encourage student participation in tutoring sessions after school and summer school.

The board decided any student, who is in danger of failing grades K-12, will be required to participate in after school tutoring and/or summer school. Parents of students, who are failing, will be contacted by school officials of their children's status at the appropriate intervals.

Failure to comply with the policy will result in the student's being retained at the same grade level (K-8) and/or reporting to the subject in grades (9-12).

The school administration will assess each individual student's record and reserves the authority to make any and all exceptions to the policy.

A parent whose child was suspended for bringing an alcoholic beverage to the middle school addressed the board Tuesday night.

The parent said her child had been punished with a 10-day suspension, but other students guilty of the same thing were not required to finish their 10 days.

The board analyzed the situation and board member Billy Tarpley said, "Since I made the motion at the last meeting then I would like to speak.

"I would like to express my concern for the children's grades. I would like to see the children do academic work to teach them a lesson instead of taking them away from what they need. I would like to see students working on school work and knowing they have to get it done. This way they learn from it, but at the same time it is punishment. I also know that we cannot command the administration to do anything, but I would like to make a motion that the school board extend the same options of punishment for this child as we did for the others recently punished. I would rather see a child be sick of doing extra work that they know has to be completed than to see them be suspended with nothing academic to do."

Tarpley asked the original decision be amended to ask the middle school administration to allow the child to do extra work and make the work missed from the fourth day she was suspended until the 10th day of her suspension.

The board voted to do so with the child receiving three actual days of suspension, with the rest of the six days work being made up and extra work being assigned.