SCHOOL BOARD OKs EXPERIMENTAL PROGRAMS

JACKSON -- Two experimental education programs were approved by the Jackson Board of Education Monday night.

The board voted to pilot an all-day kindergarten class and a new alternative school program for students in grades nine through 12. Both programs will be expanded after a year if they are successful.

The all-day kindergarten pilot will be conducted during the 1997-98 school year at North Elementary School. Enrollment in the program will be limited to students who reside in the school district, but parents will have the option of enrolling their child in a half-day program at another school.

Superintendent Howard Jones said several questions still exist regarding the pilot program that will have to be answered before the next school year. The main question will be whether construction will be finished on the school, but administrators anticipate construction will be completed by the Aug. 1 projection.

"This is an ideal opportunity for us to test the water, so to speak, and have an all-day kindergarten operating," Jones said. "If it is successful, we can look at offering all-day kindergarten throughout the district the following year."

Students and parents won't have to wait until August for the alternative school program to begin. Administrators hope to have the program up and running with at least five students by mid-March. Rick McClard, assistant principal of Jackson High School, said approximately $49,000 has been approved from the Division of Youth Service, Juvenile Court Diversion Grant, to fund the pilot program.

Initial enrollment in the project will be limited to students in ninth through 12th grades. If successful, the program will be expanded to service students from elementary school through high school. Students who participate in the program will be required to remain until the end of the semester in May.

"What we hope to do is take students who are not having great success in the classroom and give them some of the skills they are lacking," McClard said. "Some alternative schools are created to flow in troublemakers. This is not the idea of our program; we are trying to give the students the skills they need to make it in a regular classroom."

Board members also approved an alternate schedule for weather make-up days. Six of the eight days missed this year will be made up and school will be dismissed on May 23. If no other days are missed from bad weather, graduation will not be moved and students will still get out of school before Memorial Day.

Scheduled make-up days include Presidents Day Feb. 17; District Teachers Meeting March 21; Monday after Easter March 31; and three scheduled make-up days, May 21, 22 and 23.