Students arrived on the 15 campuses of the Bulloch County Schools district Tuesday morning for the start of the 2023-24 term with no major problems reported. Answers to “What’s new this year?” include a return to 90-minute block scheduling at Statesboro High and Portal High, and about 186 new personnel throughout the system.
Principal Jennifer Wade certainly isn’t one of those newcomers. Now starting her eighth year as principal at Mill Creek Elementary School, she was a teacher there for 13 years beginning in 2001 and worked at the school district’s central office for three years before returning to MCES in the lead administrative role.
“Our theme this year is ‘Constructing a Brighter Future,’ because we are resetting and rebuilding, and we have several new teachers and we have two new (assistant principals) that are new to the building but are veterans A.P.’s, and we have new curriculum with math,” Wade said. “There’s just a lot that’s going on.”
What’s new in the math curriculum is a set of statewide math standards developed over several years and being fully implemented this year. Her new assistant principals are Scott Chapman, Ed.D., previously principal of William James Middle School, and Tammy Francis, previously an assistant principal at Statesboro High.
And yes, “resetting and rebuilding” is a reference to continuing efforts to catch students up after gaps in learning left by the COVID-19 pandemic, even though the original school shutdown and its aftermath of half-virtual home schooling is now two to three years in the past.
“We still have students coming from home school, and last year we had eight of our students who were in first or second grade who had never been in school before, and so we’re still trying to catch up and get them to where they need to be,” Wade said, “and it’s not just them, it’s students who were virtual and students who came back and then went back virtual. There are so many students on so many different levels.”
So the “Constructing a Brighter Future” theme reflects an effort to build a solid foundation for all, she said. She added school improvement specialists for English-language arts and math to the MCES faculty last year to assist teachers. The school also has two MTSS or “multi-tiered system of supports” coordinators, one for grades K-2 and another for grades 3-5, who serve as intervention teachers and as coaches for teachers helping get students back on grade level.
Interviewed about 8:30 a.m. Tuesday, Wade reported that her school, which has about 580 students in prekindergarten through fifth grade, had a “perfect” first morning arrival time. After 7:50 a.m., class was officially in session.
“Perfect! We had music going, parents walking their children to the classroom, not too much crying — from the parents,” she said. “I mean, it was great. I couldn’t ask for a better start.”
Block scheduling
Superintendent of Schools Charles Wilson had visited Mill Creek and also Sallie Zetterower Elementary School before reaching Statesboro High School, where he gave media interviews at 9:30 a.m. He visited seven schools during the day.
Asked, “What’s new?” he noted that Statesboro High and also the high school grades at Portal Middle High now have block schedules, with four 90-minute class blocks instead of seven shorter periods each day. Full-credit classes can then be completed in a single semester instead of lasting all year. Teachers teach three classes each day and then have one block for planning.
That is nothing new at Southeast Bulloch High School, which was already using block scheduling, but now all three high schools have this type of plan. All three previously used block scheduling several years ago but went to shorter classes partly because of financial and staffing shortfalls that are no longer an issue, he said. Southeast Bulloch had returned to a block schedule after only one year.
Having all the high schools on a similar schedule, with longer classes, fits with planning for a “Career Academy Concept” across the district, Wilson said. Especially for career-path courses that would attract fewer students at any one school, the idea is to offer some different courses at each of the high schools and provide transportation for students to take courses at the other schools for a portion of the day. This does not involve any plan for a separate career academy campus, he emphasized.
“With the needs that we have about our Career Academy Concept across this district in terms of all of our schools being delivery points — a larger program, so to speak — we’re going to need that scheduling flexibility, so it’s really planning ahead and positioning ourselves, and it also does give students more opportunities,” Wilson said.
At Statesboro High School, which has more than 1,700 students, the change in scheduling requires many individual adjustments.
“We’re getting used to it — everybody’s getting used to it right now — but I think it’s going to be great for us, and I’m very pleased that the district went to this schedule,” said SHS Principal Keith Wright, now starting his third year leading the largest school in the district. Before that, he spent two years as principal of Langston Chapel Elementary School after two years as an assistant principal at Langston Chapel Middle.
“The advantage I see as far as the block versus seven is, kids are focusing now on just four classes a semester versus having to focus on seven classes,” he said. “So that’s a huge advantage I see for our students as well as our teachers. With the longer classes, a teacher is able to do enrichment as well as remediation.”
Two new principals
Among the 15 schools, only two have new principals this year, the two middle schools in the Statesboro zone.
John McAfee, Ed.D., is new as principal at William James Middle School, but he has returned to the Bulloch County Schools after spending an earlier part of his career here.
Prior to becoming an administrator, McAfee was a teacher for eight years at Screven County High School. He then became special education coordinator at Southeast Bulloch High School from 2011 to 2014.
He also served four years as an assistant principal in Screven County and two years as an assistant principal at Langston Chapel Elementary School. He was principal of Jefferson County High School in Louisville for three years before being hired for the WJMS job, and so has 20 years total experience as an educator.
Meanwhile, Willie Robinson, Ed.D., is the new principal of Langston Chapel Middle School. He was most recently principal of Allendale-Fairfax Middle School in Fairfax, South Carolina, for three years after being promoted from assistant principal. He had also served as an assistant principal at both Murphey Middle School and Sego Middle School in Augusta.
Both new principals had been described by Wilson as having experience with “turn-around schools.” Both have been on the job here since around July 1, getting ready for the school year.
That year was already off to a great start at Langston Chapel Middle School last Thursday evening, July 27, when the school welcomed parents and students to its open house and Robinson spoke to the parents of sixth-graders during their orientation, he said.
“We had a humongous crowd, and I asked people who had been here at Langston, ‘Is this normal?’ and they said ‘no.’ So we had a lot of parents who came out for open house and we just had something very special for them when they came,” Robinson said Tuesday. “Our building says that we are excited to have parents in the building, and so does our attitude.”
Employees and students
The 186 newly hired Bulloch County Schools employees of all job descriptions make up approximately 9% of the school system’s total of about 2,100 employees. Roughly half of that total are classroom teachers, said the school district’s Public Relations Director Hayley Greene.
Bulloch County Schools held a teacher induction kickoff event for teachers new to the system July 18 and another for those brand-new to teaching July 19. But the induction programs last through the year with monthly sessions, Greene said. A day-long orientation for all 186 new hires was held July 20 in the Statesboro High auditorium.
Tuesday, a preliminary attendance count showed 10,691 students present at the schools. But the Bulloch County Schools had more than 11,100 students enrolled as of June, and attendance is likely to top that this fall, with an official enrollment report not due until October, Greene noted.