Beach Elementary ready for earlier start
Beach Elementary School is open for business on Monday, Aug. 8 -two weeks before last year’s Aug. 23 start.
“(The earlier start) made the summer a lot shorter, so getting everything prepared for the start of school has been more difficult. But, we’re ready for the kids at any time,” said Principal Larry Wood.
Teachers and staff have been putting in ‘voluntary’ hours prepping for the early start.
This week marks the official start for those personnel members. Beach school teachers are involved with in-services this week, preparing their classrooms and getting all their materials and supplies. The school will have an Open House event on Saturday, Aug. 6, from 9 to 10:30 a.m.
“We’re disaggregating the data and developing our school improvement plan based on that data,” said Wood. “Our focus will be on learning gains for every child. The new textbook adoption for the district is Science. We will continue to use the SMILE writing program.”
Besides his regular “seasoned” educators, one new teacher is joining his staff and another is sliding into a more prominent role. Shannon Golden will be the new part-time Music teacher, and Kerrie Stephenson takes over the overall Paraprofessional duties after Maria Sharp retired from that post after 10 years. Part-time Art teacher Holly Nichols and Physical Education teacher Julie Hulslander also return for their second year.
Principal Wood will be adding time to the school day for some students and educators. The move is to help some students make learning gains in Reading and Math from one year to the next for better FCAT scores that will aid the school in hopes to raise its overall school grade back up to an “A” status after dropping to a “B” last year.
“We’re looking to extend the school day for some of our kids. We’ll be looking at our data from last year and identify kids who have needs in certain areas. Then, we will design programs before and after school to meet the needs of those individual kids,” said Wood. “Last year, the kids received the same education or a better one than the kids did the year before. It’s just that they didn’t score as well. It didn’t affect the quality of their education, just their scores weren’t as good.”
He also said certain teachers, like the art and music teachers, will be helping his full-time teachers work in small groups with students who have individual needs.
“They have a few extra hours during the week, and we will utilize those hours to help kids in Reading and Math and those kind of things,” said Wood. “We are going to utilize all of our human resources to the best of our ability.
“Our experienced teaching staff are outstanding teachers and very flexible. You have to be very flexible in a small school like this because a few children moving in and out can make a difference in terms of configuration of the class.”
The school principal reports a number of new children will attend Beach Elementary this year, and the overall number may be larger than last year. Thus, his teachers may have to teach more than one grade level.
“Because of our small numbers, we don’t get enough teachers to have two for every grade level,” Wood said. “All of our teachers have taught a ‘combination’ class in the past.”
The school’s very able administrative staff is also pitching in more than they have in the past. Jackie DeMilia, who works in technology support and acts as the school librarian, will be teaching computer classes and will be more involved in classroom work as well.
Wood pointed out Bookkeeper/Informational Specialist Linda Gassner takes care of attendance, runs the Accelerated Reader Program and RIF program; Principal Secretary Renee Mulloy is also the school receptionist, clerk typist, calendar organizer, unofficial “nurse” and is involved with “Spirit of the Holidays” and other school benefits (as well as providing answers to this writer’s numerous questions); and Building Supervisor Michael Cribbs, who appears to be at all functions, will continue to lend a hand whenever needed.
“We have the best staff in the school district. They continually volunteer to do things that are not part of their job description. Not only is this a community school because the community involves itself, but our staff does whatever is necessary,” said Wood. “We are going to pull out all of the stops to give our kids the best education possible.”
Even Food Service Manager Gayle MacPeek directs and produces the school plays. How’s that for juggling two jobs?
“I would wager that there is not one other chef in the school district that does something like that,” said Wood. “Our people do whatever is necessary to make this successful. I am so lucky.”
School times remain the same with an 8 a.m. start and 2:15 p.m. dismissal. Students are allowed in at 7:30 a.m. for a free school breakfast every morning.
People have compared Beach Elementary to a private school, though it does have the same resources and benefits as a large school in Lee County.
“It’s like a private school setting because of the size of it, a healthy number of staff based upon the student ratio, our class sizes are small, an outstanding staff and a tremendous amount of support from the community and the parents,” said Wood.
Every parent is invited for a free breakfast on the first day of the school year.
“It gives a new parent a chance to meet some of the parents who have been around for a while. It will be very informal,” said Wood.
There will also be a Pool Party on Friday, Aug, 12, to give parents and students another chance to mingle.
The Beach Elementary Parent Teacher Organization will again be putting on benefits for the school year.
“Our PTO is just a great organization. We have some new signs that we bought to put up at events to let everyone know this is a PTO event,” said Wood. “I think once people see all the good things happening with the PTO, we’ll get even more participation then we have in the past.”