Two PCHS Girls Expelled For One Year Due To Drug Abuse At School

Marlinton, WV – The Pocahontas County Board of Education held two confidential expulsion hearings prior to the regular board meeting Monday night. When the regular started, the board voted to expel both female students for one year. Student A was expelled for bringing a pill and marijuana to school and sniffing a pill in the bathroom. Student B was expelled for sniffing a prescription pill in the bathroom.

With that somber duty behind them, the board turned their attention to a presentation about the Pocahontas County Multipurpose Community Center. The new facility, to be shared by Marlinton Elementary School and the public will be built adjacent to the school. The late Senator Robert Byrd secured the 2.9 million dollar funding to pay for the center. Roger Trusler says they’ve been working to make this center a reality for about five years.

“I guess in this case, patience is a virtue and we’re getting to the point that it’s paying off” he says. “We’ve jumped through all the hoops with the [Dept of] Housing and Urban Development. We expect by December 1st to have a Notice to Proceed and all the financial accounts will be set up for electronic transfers and things of that nature.”

Dale Withrow of the Chapman Technical Group then showed the board conceptual drawings of the proposed center. He says the new building will be integrated with the school.

“What we’re proposing is tying onto the end of the existing music building perpendicular to that with the new community center” he says. “We’re going to be providing you with a middle school size gymnasium with a basketball court, multipurpose rooms, racketball courts, a wellness center.”

Withrow says it will also include bathrooms, a concession stand and administrative offices. He says it’s also designed to accommodate different uses.

“We will be able to lock out the wellness center, the racketball courts and the multipurpose rooms from the gymnasium, the gymnasium will only be accessed by the school” says Withrow. “After school hours, we will be able to lock out the school from the rest of the building and open it up to the entire public. They will have full access to the building, but not to the school.”

Withrow says this is a long process that could take up to 2 years to complete. He says they hope to be ready to bid the project by next summer. Withrow says the next step is to get geotechnical surveys done to see if the ground needs further shoring up in order to support the facility. He’s also getting input from school staff and will coordinate with the school maintenance personnel to tie the new building into the existing fire and security systems.

In other business, Diane Delfino says she and School Nurse Jenny Friel have scheduled a county wide meeting to talk with wellness teams from the county schools. This will be followed up with meetings at individual schools.

The personnel agenda was approved as presented. You can go to our website, amr.org to see the full personnel list.

Approved Personnel Agenda :

A medical leave of absence for Green Bank teacher Danielle Goode once her sick leave days have been exhausted – approximate return date is Jan 31st 2011

Requested transfer for Denise Elliott from itinerant teacher of visually impaired to itinerant teacher of visually impaired/special education for county schools – this represents the combining of two previously separate teaching postions

Employment from the preferred recall list of Carolyn Pennington as a special classroom/bus aide

Employment of Sharon Moore as a substitute teacher for the county

Requested change in employment term for Samantha McClure as a Academic Intervistionist at Hillsboro Elementary from six hours per day to three hours per day

And creation of two itinerant teacher of special education/autism positions for the county schools.