PAGE — When snow is falling on the ground and the children are out of school for Christmas break, it does not mean that Page Unified School District schools stop running. This time is used to catch up on work, plan the second half of the current school year and look ahead to the 2008-09 school year.

Page Middle School principal Eric Bonniksen said his staff has been working over the Christmas break on wrapping up the first semester of the school year, getting the report cards out to students and getting new schedules printed for the second semester. He said the employees went through the students’ grades to see where each student stood, and if some of those students were struggling in school, then they would put together some plans to help improve them academically.

The administrative staff has also looked at the students’ attendance rates. He said attendance rates have been good overall, but there are a few students in the school that have been targeted as needing more assistance in that area.

For the second half of the school year, the middle school is going to be putting in a new after-school compensatory program for the English Language Learner students. The program will begin this month and will help them to be more proficient on the English language test, Bonniksen said.

Page High School principal Perry Berry said what would be happening with the high school in the upcoming months would be a financial aid night for parents. This would begin tomorrow. Its purpose is to have counselors from the school educate parents on how to fill out financial aid forms so that their students can go to college.

“In the spring, we’re really busy pre-registering and registering students for the next school year. So a lot of the work that we’re doing right now…we’ll be working on changing schedules and transcripts and getting our course description handbook ready for next year.” Berry said.

In the handbook, there will be some new courses added in, while some current courses will be dropped from the curriculum. The new classes would be brought to the PUSD governing board to be approved, and then the high school would advertise their new curriculum.

On March 6, the high school will have an eighth-grade parent night. On this night, the counselors will go to the middle school and invite the parents of the eighth graders into the high school’s library. The purpose will be to educate parents on the registration timelines and what courses the school has to offer to the students.

Another event that will be happening on March 10 through March 12 is a teen maze. The high school puts up a huge maze in the pool gym, and they let individual classes walk through it.

“Within each part of the maze, there’s a different educational corner, from healthy eating lifestyles to abstinence-based sex education issues and drug awareness,” he said.

The high school will be hosting parent-teacher conferences on March 25 and 27.

In April, the counselors will be going to the Kaibeto and Big Water schools to help future PHS students understand the courses that the school has and to help pre-register them for their freshman day. The high school will also be hosting the Special Olympics on April 25 at the football field.

Desert View Elementary School principal Lorna Loy said that over the Christmas break, the staff has been catching up on documenting items for No Child Left Behind and a variety of grants so that they can submit them for audits.

The school has also been looking at its reading, writing and math data to figure out where it should go to prepare students and teachers alike for state standardized tests such as Arizona’s Instrument to Measure Standards and TerraNova. It has also been planning for the ELL mandates and laws that have to be implemented by this fall.

Literacy goals are also required to be implemented by fall. Even though the Arizona Department of Education does not require them now, Loy is creating spring goals for the school. A few of these will include focusing on grammar, syntax, and oral and written vocabulary.

Loy said the after school programs will be back in session in a couple of weeks. There will also be an evening music program scheduled this month.

The elementary school staff members will also use this time to plan their 2008-09 school year.

“As a district, we usually come up with a district calendar first, and then we’re able to plan all of our buildings around that,” Loy said.

During the planning period, she will have to implement a state-required four-hour English language development block into the new school year as well, which will affect the new school year’s schedule. There will also be a reconfiguring of federal monies to help support the ELL students. On top of that, the school will be making sure that all elementary teachers who are teaching ELL students are highly qualified and have the correct endorsements.

Finally, Desert View has been working on a school-wide behavior plan, and they are now getting to the point where they are finalizing it.

“You always have classroom management. We also have a school-wide management system, and we’ve had a committee working on that, too. (It will) kind of create a positive school climate,” she said.

What will complement those two things will be a comprehensive counseling grant. This will help the counselors do preventative things in group and classroom settings.

Lake View Elementary School principal Cheryl Chuckluck was unavailable to comment on what her school did during the winter break.

Share on Facebook