Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 10, 2012)
Heppner Gazette-Times, Heppner, Oregon Wednesday, October 10,2012 - SEVEN Lack of teacher time, student apathy dim hope for writing improvement Bv April Sykes A frustrated and over worked high school English teacher told the Morrow County School Board Mon day night that she didn’t hold out much hope for improving students’ Eng lish skills because of lack of time, increases in class size, and students’ apathy and addiction to computers and text messaging. Heppner High School language arts teacher Jean- nie Collins told the board that she has 32 students, and because of time constraints resulting from declining enrollment at HHS and bud get issues, and subsequent increases in class sizes, she is unable to spend as much time with the students as she would like. She said that if she spent as much time as would be necessary to grade students' papers and make comments in their papers to improve their writing skills, she would be up until 2 a.m. every night. She added that students are not getting the prerequisite writing in struction necessary because freshman writing has been removed from the school’s curriculum because of re duced enrollment. She cited a downturn, not only in skills, but in the perceived importance of spelling and writing. “ I think w e’re in a downward trend,” she add ed. "There is a lot of apathy. Kids don’t care and they believe computers are go ing to fix it.” She also said that she feels that she has a "big target” on her because of in creasing demands on teach ers because of state testing of students’ writing skills and state mandates that a certain percentage o f stu dents must pass the tests. “ I know that som e teachers feel it’s all on their shoulders,” she said. MCSD Superintendent Dirk Dirksen told the board that financial help will not be forthcoming because of state budget constraints. He and district Chief Financial Office Andrew Fletcher said that any increases in state school funding will most likely be eaten up by increases in the Pub lic Employees Retirement System (PERS) costs to school districts. He said that a projected increase to $6.3 million in the state budget for education for the next budget year, from $5.7 this year, will likely only result in "flat funding” for the schools, because the difference will be paid out in PERS costs. “It’s going to be a dif ficult pill to swallow,” he said. (In a related story on page one of this issue of the Gazette-Times, the PERS Board recently voted to increase PERS employee contributions by $900 mil lion for the 2013-2015 bien nium.) Also at the meeting, the board approved a resolution in which they accepted and appropriated several grants, previously unanticipated: $5.000 from the Oregon Department of Education to Irrigon Elementary School to “support the participation in workshops and comple tion o f the school self- evaluation tool”; $11,263 from the State of Oregon to support teacher devel opment; and $42,407 to help rural and low-income school programs. “We are going to spend it wisely,” said Dirksen, who added that the majority of the money is connected to staff developm ent in working with low-income students. The board approved rev ised p o licy re g a rd ing reim bursable school meals and milk programs, taking the words "m ilk” and “free milk” from the verbiage, substituting the phrase "Supplemental Nu trition Assistance Programs (SN A P)” for A dult and Family Services and in cluded the following: -“The district will offer SMP (Special Milk Pro gram) without the free op tion to students who are not able to participate in the district’s lunch or breakfast programs”; -substituted “Meet all minimum and maximum calorie requirem ents by grade level” for the phrase “Meet at least the minimum nutrient standards set for calories, protein, calcium, iron, vitamin A and vitamin -substituted “Meet the maximum standards set for sodium by grade level” for the previous wording “Offer less sodium and cholesterol and increase the level of dietary fiber over time. The district will use a USDA approved menu planning approach to plan meals and snacks claimed for reimbursement”; -eliminated the words “total fat” in the sentence “Meet the maximum stan dards set for total fat and saturated fat.” The new poliqy was Wallten GREGWALDEN.COM IZI Reduce Red Tape and Regulations That Threaten Jobs Stop Piling Debt on Our Children and Grandchildren Manage Our Forests and Put People Back to Work in the Woods 1 3 Create More Access to Wireless Broadband to Produce Jobs IZI take three of four food items including one-half cup of fruit offered in program breakfasts.” In other business, the board: -discussed a possible trend toward students en rolling in charter schools and how they might reverse the trend. -received the following enrollment report as of Oc tober 2012 : A .C. Houghton Elementary School, Irrigon (kindergarten through grade three)-273; Sam Boardman Elementary School, Board- man (k-three)-348; Hep pner Elementary School (k-six)-172; Irrigon El em entary School (four- six)-203; Windy River Ele mentary School, Boardman (four-six)-210; Heppner Junior/Senior High School (seven-12)-176: Irrigon Junior/Senior High School (seven-12)-362; Riverside High School, Boardman (seven-12)-398; other-42; total-2,184. -accepted the following resignations/retirements: June Dabling, retiring from RHS special ed assistant; Raylena Cimiyotti, 1JSH special ed assistant. -approved early gradu ation from Heppner High School for Alyssa Wizner. -approved a School A chievem ent C om pact Committee consisting of the following: Dirk Dirk sen, G eorge M endoza, Craig Benson, Mark Jones, Marilyn Post, Lori Frank, Rick Drake, Dave Fowler, Brenda Profitt, Kyle Car penter, Kathie Good and Rose Norwood. -heard the following announcements: Oregon School Board Association fall regional meeting, Oct. 10, 6 p.m.; end of the first nine weeks, Oct. 12; OSBA convention, Portland, Nov 8-11; Veterans Day holi day, Nov. 12; next board meeting, Sam Boardman Elementary, Tuesday, Nov 13, because of the Veter ans Day holiday, 7 p.m.; Thanksgiving holiday, Nov 22-23. . -held an executive ses sion concerning personnel issues and expulsion of a student. C”; fregfflL _ WORKING HARD IZI IZI FOR US. revised as follows: - “High school students must take at least three of five different food items, “including one half cup of fruit or vegetables” offered in program lunches; -"The district will use the offer versus serve op tion when serving pro gram breakfasts to senior high school students. High school students must take at least three or four food items including one-half cup of fruit or vegetables offered in program break fasts.” -"The district will use the offer versus serve op tion when serving program lunches to students below senior high school grades. Students below high school grades will be required to take three of five food items including one-half cup of fruit or vegetables offered in program lunches.” -“The district will use the offer versus serve op tion when serving program breakfasts to students below senor high school grades. Students below high school grades will be required to Defend Our Water and Property Rights IZI Make America More Energy Independent ns the Benefits fcmed Secretary of State candidate attends Heppner town hall By David Sykes Oregon Secretary of State candidate Knute Bue hler and his wife Patti were in attendance at a Sept. 30 town hall meeting in Hepp ner, where he said if Oregon doesn’t pull itself out of its downward economic spiral. “We could end up the Mis sissippi of the West.” Buehler says his op ponent, incumbent Kate Brown, is not welcoming to business in Oregon. “ I would encourage more business to come here. 1 would work to cut the red tape and regulations. We are the third highest state in the country when it comes to government regulations,” Buehler said. He also said Oregon is now 43 out of 50 in quality of education. Buehler is a native Or egonian, a Rhodes Scholar, physician and business owner. He was born and raised in Roseburg and says he attended Oregon State University, where he played college baseball. He told the crowd of about 40 at the town hall that the Secretary of State's office needs to be fairer and less partisan. Buehler said independent voters in Or egon are treated especially badly and he would change that. He said the v o te rs ’ pamphlet is a mess and needs to be straightened out and become more nonpar tisan. “I see manipulation of the voters’ pamphlet all the time.” Buehler also thinks the initiative process where citizens can put issues on the ballot has been abused by the Secretary of State so badly that only corporations now have the resources to Secretary of State Candidate Knute Buehler and wife Patti speak with Heppner resident IMelha Folckomerat recent town hall meeting. Photo by David Sykes the special interests who are buying Salem. One of Buehler's fa vorite quotes at the town hall about his opponent was “ Is she slippery or sloppy?” in reference to an article in Willamette Week newspaper. “Kate Brown is in tin unenviable position of ha' ing to convince voters she ; sloppy rather than slippery, said the newspaper. The town hall meet ing was sponsored by the Willow Creek lea Party Patriots on Sunday, Sept. 30 at Heppner City Hall and was attended by about 40 people. use it. “ I have seen her (the current secretary of state) throw out pages and pages o f signatures because of a clerical error,” he says. “That is just not right.” He said the current Sec retary o f State has been in Salem so long she no longer understands regular citizens. “She has been in Salem 20 years. I haven’t been sitting in Salem voting the party line and taking special interests,” Buehler says. And he asked for people's vote and for financial help for his campaign. He says he needs $200,000 to fight Tumbling, aerobic classes to begin Tumbling classes for children ages three to 11 will start this Friday, Oct. 12, at the Morrow County Fair grounds. Aerobic classes for adults will begin Nov. 13 at the same location. Classes will be held at 6:15 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. For more information, contact Cindy Sumner at 989-8514. Congratulations to Corey Sweeney, MCGG Employee of the Quarter We are proud to have Corey as an employee at MCGG. He has been with MCGG for over 12 years where he has worked in the propane department. Corey goes out of his way to help people and does above and beyond what is expected. M a rra w (« « in ly C ra in t r i n i n « Good Job Corey U Lexington 989-8221 • 1-800-452-7396 I
