Fort Frye talks curriculum update
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By Douglass Huxley
Staff Reporter
BEVERLY -- The Fort Frye Board of Education held its regular meeting Thursday night at the Beverly-Center Elementary in Beverly.
The board heard an update from Superintendent Stephanie Starcher and Director of Curriculum and Special Education Nichol Honaker spoke about a universal screener change.
During the superintendent update Starcher talked about implementing a new policy to have Naloxone, another name for Narcan, available in school offices.
"This is not reactive," Starcher said. "We're being very proactive, in the fact that we don't see any harm to anybody, and that by being proactive, if we would happen to have a situation where we would need to administer it, we have it."
Starcher said this would be a policy for first reading during the April meeting of the school board. She said there were law enforcement reports of fentanyl being found in vape products in Zanesville. She said this would not cost the school system and access to it was now easier.
"Now that the health department can provide those to the schools, it'll just be much easier," Starcher said.
Starcher also said during her update bids were out for building the secure vestibules at each school site and there would be another meeting later to review those bids. She said there was progress being made to the athletic field house with footers being put in place for the second floor addition and work on the Fort Frye High School gym floor will begin next week.
Honaker spoke to the board about a change from the i-Ready program used for assessments now to one that better screens for dyslexia.
"i-Ready was not listed as one of the assessments that could be used for the new dyslexia legislation. So, that was very concerning for our system," Honaker said. "So, we decided to explore some other options."
Honaker said a committee of teachers and principals was gathered to come up with criteria they felt was needed for a universal screener. She said the criteria was based on the administrators' experience with i-Ready and what they wanted in the universal screener, and on the new dyslexia legislation. She said not a lot of vendors met the requirements of that legislation.
"So, we looked at that and we had a couple companies present their products to us," Honaker said. "The teachers were able to get in there and see what that would look like on an administrative level. I really want to make sure that it's going to put out a lot of great reports that we can use easily as a district."
Honaker said they found NWEA (Northwest Evaluation Association), a research-based, not-for-profit organization that supports students and educators worldwide by creating assessment and learning solutions.
"It's called Map Growth," Honaker said. "Grades three through eight is what we're proposing. That they would take this assessment, and it's given three times a year, and it'll give us data for ELA (English Language Arts) reading, for math, and for science. Which is something we haven't been able to universally screen in the past."
Honaker said teachers of younger students wanted an assessment where the student actually read orally to the teacher rather than using a computer like in the i-Ready program. She said the program they found to replace that was from a company called Amplify which uses a program called mClass.
"That is a reading assessment that will give us some really valid information because the child sits down one on one with the teacher," Honaker said. "The teacher goes through the assessment on either a Chromebook touchscreen, or tablet touchscreen, and the teacher has the administration of the test in front of them but the child has nothing in front of them."
Honaker said changing to these two assessments will save the district money.
"Our i-Ready contract was anywhere from, it fluctuated, but it's anywhere from $24,000 to $36,000 a year, which is one of my biggest curriculum contracts out there per year," Honaker said. "This program is considerably more affordable."
She said it will cost $6,000 for three years of the mClass assessment and $14.50 per student, with three assessments for math, reading and science, for the Map Growth assessments totalling $6,000 for a one year contract.
"Thank you for all you do," Board President Johnna Zalmanek said to Honaker after her presentation.
During the consent agenda the board approved a number of resignations including; Garrett Lochary, JV baseball coach, Morgan Baker, second grade teacher at Salem-Liberty elementary, Jason Casto, assistant varsity softball coach, Amy Kilburn, first grade teacher at Salem-Liberty, Randy North, bus driver, and Eric Henniger, elementary and middle school art teacher.
The board also approved the retirement of Diana Booth, educational aide at Salem-Liberty Elementary which will take effect May 31.
"Diana Booth, Lloyd's wife (board member Lloyd Booth), has worked for us for 36 years," Starcher said. "At the end of the year, anyone who is retiring from the district, we bring them to the last meeting and we can give them a blanket and honor them."
During the administrative and financial agenda the board approved a two-year limited contract to Jennifer Worthington as a school psychologist for the Fort Frye Local School District for the 2023-2024 school year.
"She has her master's degree and is working on her doctorate degree, and if you look at her resume, and all her credentials, it's absolutely amazing," Starcher said.
"I'm very excited. I'm very appreciative of this opportunity," Worthington said. "It's been 13 years since I was a Cadet, so I'm excited to be back."
They approved to adopt and purchase curriculum material from McGraw Hill. The purchase will include a six-year contract in the amount of $64,764.35 for Wonders English Language Arts (ELA) for grades 4-5; a six-year contract in the amount of $59,906.35 for Study Sync ELA for grades 6-8; a six-year contract in the amount of $41,119.13 for Savaas Science for grades 3-8; and a six-year contract in the amount of $51,312.509 for Savaas ELA for grades 9-12.
They also accepted contracts from VSWC Architects in the amount of $36,750 for the Beverly-Center kitchen walk-in cooler project, contract with Energy Optimizers for the Fort Frye High School gym project and approved the Superintendent and Treasurer to solicit bids for the construction of the kitchen walk-in cooler at Beverly-Center Elementary with a projected probable cost of $296,000.
Starcher said the Fort Frye School District will be hiring a new art teacher and substitute bus drivers.
"Fort Frye has one of the area's greatest pay for substitute bus drivers and van drivers," Starcher said.
She said anyone interested in applying to the positions can contact the superintendent's office.
The next meeting of the Fort Frye Board of Education will be April 17 at Fort Frye High School in the Cadet College and Career Center room at 5:30 p.m. The meeting is open to the public.
Douglass Huxley can be reached at dhuxley@newsandsentinel.com