Arbor View High School student Alyssa Otremba, 15, was killed Sept. 2 walking home from school, and 16-year-old Faith Lutheran Jr/Sr High School student Christina Portaro died Sept. 3 in an ATV accident in Brian Head, Utah. The schools and their administrators prepare for these tragedies so they are able to respond to their students’ needs in the most effective way possible.
Children with disabilities face an uphill battle in school as it is. For those without parents or guardians to look out for their best interests, it’s even tougher.
The Educational Surrogate Parent Program provides these children with an advocate whose sole purpose is to ensure their academic needs are being met.
Clark County School District administrators, counselors and teachers visited about 300 homes across the Las Vegas Valley on a recent Saturday morning as part of the Reclaim Your Future initiative to encourage students who have not enrolled this year to come back to class.
Dwight Jones is entering his ninth month as superintendent and faces a $150 million budget deficit. Of the school district’s more than 20,000 seniors, half are not on track to graduate this year. More rigorous curriculum and tougher standardized tests are likely going to lower proficiency scores and the graduation rate in coming years. These problems weigh heavy on Jones’ mind and keep him working late hours.
The Bermuda grass quad at the center of Griffith Elementary School has been replaced with desert landscaping and elevated garden beds for student interaction. The $20,000 project was sponsored by the Water Conservation Coalition.
Troy Gillett, a University of Nevada, Las Vegas, alumnus, has created two winding columns of about 5,000 T-shirts for display at Lied Library as part of UNLV’s events commemorating the 10th anniversary of 9/11. The T-shirts were given to UNLV by New York-New York, which collected them from a shrine that was created outside the hotel following the terrorist attacks.
You’ve probably seen Dino Derouineau’s artwork around town and never questioned who did it. His paints grace most of the middle and high schools in the Las Vegas Valley, and some elementary schools. Some of his work includes the bear mural at Brinley Middle School and the 40-foot-wide leopard mural at Burkholder Middle School.
When-children-are-present signs are becoming more popular all over the valley in school zones. But the Henderson, Metropolitan and Clark County School District police departments all had different answers for what the phrase actually means.
Clark County School District students had an increase in math proficiency at the middle and high school levels last year, although reading proficiency dropped. Educators say the adoption of Common Core State Standards for curriculum this year will result in tougher standardized tests.
This school year will open with more changes than any other in recent memory, and it has principals excited. There’s a new superintendent, a new measuring stick for student performance and new curriculum. Despite $150 million in budget cuts for education, Southeast Career and Technical Academy will proceed with a $32 million renovation that is being financed as part of a 1998 capital improvement bond.
More than 500 Clark County School District teachers face being laid off next month if the district and teachers union don’t reach a new contract agreement very soon. Among the concessions the district has asked the teachers union to agree to is a new contract that would eliminate pay raises this year and save the district about $56 million.
