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District Tackles Rescheduling: Groveport Madison Board Asks Retired Superintendent to Help Manage Process

Posted on: Sunday, 29 January 2006, 15:00 CST

By Charlie Roduta, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

Jan. 29--Five years after he left, the Groveport Madison school board is turning to a former superintendent for help.

Yesterday, the board appointed Charles Barr to advise a network of administrators, staff members and volunteers charged with restoring the previous schedule and grade levels before split sessions started in 2003. Barr is volunteering.

On Wednesday, the board upheld an October decision to end the staggered schedule at the junior high and high school.

The board acted against the recommendations of Superintendent Timm Mackley and Treasurer Anne Spano.

Mackley had said the move could be costly and might be "disastrous," especially with an emergency-operating levy expiring in December. The board is considering asking voters in May to renew or add to the levy, which generates about $4.5 million a year.

"I haven't been back to the buildings since I retired," said Barr, who spent 38 years in the district, including 13 as superintendent. "Things were getting to the point where I wanted to come back. I want to do whatever I can to help."

Barr recently visited the schools with some board members.

"It made me sick to see what happened at our buildings," he said. "There was overcrowding at our junior high and high school. There were empty rooms in our middle and elementary schools."

More than 30 people attended yesterday's board meeting, and volunteers signed up for committees to study transportation, building space, curriculum and scheduling, public relations and finances to ease the reversion to the old schedule.

The groups will have a master facilitator, who might be Rich Playko, assistant principal at the junior high, or high-school Principal Mike Beck. The board will know by Wednesday who will manage the group, officials said.

Linda Scales, a Groveport Madison teacher for 27 years now on disability leave, said she is happy to take part in the planning process.

"This is hope that whatever direction we pursue, it will help us obtain a direction" for the district, Scales said.

Mackley did not attend yesterday's meeting. But board President June Gibbs said he backs the effort.

"He said he would do everything to support us," Gibbs said. "He didn't want to be a distraction and he said he would step aside and let us proceed with this process."

During the split sessions, the elementary schools had grades kindergarten through fourth; middle schools housed fifthand sixth-graders; the junior high held grades seven and eight; and the high school was for grades nine through 12. Classes started as early as 7 a.m. and ended as late as 6:28 p.m.

Officials said the schedule allowed about 1,600 students into a high school that holds 900 and 1,000 kids into a junior high that holds 890.

Under the schedule for this fall, elementary schools will return to grades kindergarten through fifth; middle schools will house grades sixth through eighth; the high school will revert to 10 th through 12 th grades; and freshmen will have their own building.

Barr says his return to Groveport is temporary.

"I am not after anyone's job. I don't want a job and if it's offered to me, I wouldn't take it."

croduta@dispatch.com

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

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Source: The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio

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