4-11 Pocahontas Board of Ed. – Part 2- Statewide Respect for County Math Program

Part 1 about the Pocahontas County Board of Education’s April 11^th meeting covered special recognition of staff, teachers and students. Now here’s the rest of the meeting.

Math Teachers Leah Shinaberry, Teresa Rhea, Nebraska Scotchie and Jennifer Nail enthusiastically addressed the Board about having attended and presented sessions at the WV Council for Teachers of Mathematics.

Leah Shinaberry, a Math Teacher from PCHS talked about the new statewide respect that the Pocahontas County School’s Math program is receiving because of recent outstanding improvements in student’s test scores. Leah relates about the comments she heard from one attendee from another county school system.

“One lady commented on our test scores and how she’s seen the rising of our test scores and that other people in the State are noticing what is happening here in Math in Pocahontas County” said Shinaberry. “That was just really exciting to get that feedback within the session.”

Nebraska Scotchie, a Math Teacher at Marlinton Middle School also briefly commented about what she experienced at the Council for Teachers of Mathematics.

“It was very cool to be the county people were talking about” said Scotchie.

Teresa Rhea, a Math Teacher from Marlinton Middle School also talks about the Council.

“Nebraska and I presented together on our Power Teaching Program” said Rhea. “And again (it was) awesome to see the people attend and be interested in what we were doing. There are so many people in that session that are now interested in coming to Pocahontas County and observing, not only because of what we presented there, but because of what they are hearing. We’ve been contacted from so many different counties. And last Thursday we had 8 people visit already from Nicholas County –classroom teachers and one from Central Office. And they were blown away from what our students are doing.”

It is clear that the incredible success of the Pocahontas County Math Program comes not just from Power Teaching techniques, but also from the enthusiasm, determination and commitment of the Math Teachers in all of the County’s schools.

Sue Ann Heatherly, President of the Board of the Pocahontas County Free Libraries and Susan Chappell, a member of the Hillsboro Library Friends’ Building Committee updated the Board on the progress of the proposed addition to the Hillsboro Library. Sue Ann describes the project.

“The Pocahontas County Free Libraries has given their approval and some monies allocated to begin” said Heatherly. “We’re ready when you all are to get this addition started. The main purpose of the addition is two-fold. One is to provide a children’s area in the library where we can hold classes for Hillsboro Elementary students and read aloud while the other library functions are going on, and to give Ellwood (Grimes) back some office space because he needs some space where he can catalog books. There’s also going to be a Parents Porch – and it’s right there facing the playground so the parents can have a covered area and look at their kids and pick them up when they fall down on the playground.”

They are hoping to start the project soon.

In other actions, the Board members approved various routine financial statements, invoices, reports, the WV State Auditor’s Report and Grants. They approved Board Member Joe Walker to represent the Board of Education on the County Day Report Committee.

In a money saving move, the Board approved that they be allowed to waive their rights to be covered under Worker’s Compensation during the 2016-2017 fiscal year.

They approved the 2016-2017 School Calendar as it was presented at the public meetings in Hillsboro and Green Bank and described in our earlier news stories.

They approved Shannon G. Arbogast as a Volunteer Assistant Softball Coach at the High School.

They approved the professional and Service Personnel moves which can be found on our website –alleghenymountainradio.org.

The meeting ended with an executive session on a personnel matter which would not be voted on.

Personnel Agenda approved by the Board of Education at this meeting.

PERSONNEL AGENDA April 11, 2016 Professional and Service Personnel

~AMENDED~