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Schools

Creative Sewing? School Board Considers Cutting Classes

District 833 seeking to "prepare students for 21st, if not 22nd centuries."

In terms of educating students, the District 833 School Board is thinking ahead. Far ahead.

During its Oct. 13 workshop meeting, the board heard a presentation about what types of courses the district should offer its students to better prepare them to for jobs that aren’t even currently in existence.

As part of that discussion, the board also mulled over which classes currently offered are not aligning with the board’s “Pathway to Excellence” strategic plan, and should be eliminated.

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“According to information from State Demographer Tom Gillaspy, when students graduate from high school, they’re going to hold multiple jobs by age 30, many which currently don’t exist today,” said Keith Ryskoski, assistant superintendent for secondary education. “We’re trying to find a good balance between how many things we offer and how focused to stay. We need to prepare students for the 21st century, if not the 22nd century. We need to prepare students for their future, not our past.”

What To Cut?

During the next couple of months, school officials and the board are planning to bounce around ideas about which courses are defunct and should be eliminated.

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Currently on the chopping block are:

  • keyboarding
  • black-and-white photography
  • creative writing II
  • FST math
  • problem solving math
  • human relations
  • creative sewing
  • mock trial
  • Microsoft Office applications
  • modern world novels
  • human relations
  • natural disasters
  • inquiry into contemporary issues
  • Civil War
  • gender studies
  • communication A & B
  • manufacturing technologies
Who Decides?

Replacing those courses with up-to-date ones that adhere to the district’s strategic plan is going to be the job of school leaders, the school board, and hopefully some residents and students, which is the preference of school board member Marsha Adou.

“I would like to survey parents and students surveyed as to what they would like to see,” she said. “I think we can have a lot of creative ideas about what we should eliminate. “(Parents) have so many wonderful ideas—we need to tap that (knowledge). We need to at least give them some kind of input.”

Board member Leslee Boyd asked staffers to keep the board informed about the process of cutting and adding courses as they move forward.

"I think there’s still a lot of discussion that needs to take place," Boyd said. “I don’t think there should just be this presentation and then have those that are working on this go around behind the scenes, do their jobs and then come back in February with nothing in-between. I think the board, as a whole, is going to need more along the way in this process.”

By Oct. 27, staff will be coming back to the school board with more specific recommendations of new course proposals, eliminations and modifications. 

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