Sex education, flier distribution and new schools were a few of the bigger initiatives on tap in Montgomery County’s public school system in 2006.
With enrollment leveling off, a big focus this year was on upgrading infrastructure. Altogether five new schools opened their doors, including the first newly constructed high school facility in nearly a decade — Clarksburg High.
According to schools Chief Public Information Officer Brian Edwards, the additions brought the total number of schools in the district just one short of 200, with a new crop of 1,000 teachers manning the classrooms.
In terms of programming, the long-desired goal of full-day kindergarten in all elementary schools was realized in the fall. Kate Harrison, in the district’s public information office, said the expansion to 30 more schools put Montgomery County in compliance with a statewide mandate. Testing also has proven that all-day kindergarten starts students off on the right foot. In 2001, before all-day kindergarten initiatives, only 38 percent of kindergartners were reading simple text, whereas today 81 percent go to on first-grade reading at their level.
“We’re very pleased at the academic success that these kids have shown,” Harrison told The Examiner over the summer. “It definitely makes for a certain amount of continuity for the students who used to have to go to school and then in some cases go to day care in a different location.”
Improvements to the county’s 35 middle schools are still being tweaked, as are some of the more controversial portions of the eighth and 10th grade sexual health curriculum.
A special-selected panel of parents and community members convened during the year, eventually agreeing to a much more clinical condom-usage video and teachings about homosexuality. But the ultimate curriculum choices lies in the hands of school board members.
Parents — particularly those involved in the county and individual schools’ PTA organizations — took a stand on a court decision that prompted superintendent Jerry Weast to prohibit all forms of backpack flier distributions. After months of debate, the Board of Education adopted a revised policy allowing PTAs and government entities unlimited ability to send materials home.
Edwards said the policy, however, limits nonprofits to distributions four times a year.
