David Painter was elected president of the New Richmond Board of Education for 2011 at the board’s Jan. 6 reorganization meeting.
Sharon Stark was elected vice-president.
Committee appointments for 2011 were:
Legislative Liaison: Sharon Stark, Alternative: Kevin Walriven
Student Achievement Liaison: Ben Bird
Grant Career Center Board Member: Sharon Stark
Finance and Audit Committee: David Painter and Fred Heflin
Facilities Committee: Kevin Walriven and Ben Bird
Policy Committee: David Painter and Sharon Stark
Curriculum Committee: Ben Bird and Fred Heflin
Personnel Committee: Sharon Stark and Kevin Walriven
Friday, January 7, 2011
New grading scale proposed
Superintendent Adam Bird wants to even the playing field for New Richmond High School students when it comes to competition for college scholarships.
“We’re trying to help our students be a little more competitive when it comes to earning scholarships at the collegiate level,” explained Bird who will ask the New Richmond Board of Education to approve a new grading scale this spring when the Student Handbooks are approved for the 2011-12 school year.
“We’ve learned from colleges that when it comes to awarding scholarships our students are at a competitive disadvantage compared to students from other schools because of our grading scale.”
Currently it takes a 94 average to get an A at New Richmond and that puts the school’s graduates at a disadvantage compared to students graduating from schools using the traditional 90, 80, 70, 60 percent grading scale.
“We have surveyed other schools and we have found that many of them do have a grading scale like that,” said Bird. “So when our students get a 93 percent grade in a class it will show up as a B. If a student gets a 93 at Indian Hill, Anderson, Milford or Upper Arlington, it shows up as an A on their transcript.”
The new grading scale will include plus and minus grades and will be weighted for honors (college prep classes) and AP (advanced placement) classes.
“There’s a big difference between 90 and 99 percent,” said Bird. “We want to help the student who gets a 90, but when it comes to their GPA it’s going to show as a 3.7 which is higher than the 3.0 they receive under the old system. But it’s not as high as the 4.0 that the student who gets a 99 in the class will receive.”
The proposed grading scale will award a 3.7 GPA for 90-92 percent (A-) in a regular class and 4.0 for 93-96 (A) and 97-100 (A+). Students in honors classes will receive a 4.2 GPA for 90-92, and 4.5 GPA for grades of 93-96 and 97-100. Students taking AP courses would receive a 4.7 GPA for an A- and 5.0 for an A or A+.
“ Currently a student with a B in an AP class gets a 3.75 GPA and we know that a student getting a B in an AP class is working harder than a student in gym class and a student in gym class getting an A receives a 4.0,” said Bird.
“We’re trying to help our students be a little more competitive when it comes to earning scholarships at the collegiate level,” explained Bird who will ask the New Richmond Board of Education to approve a new grading scale this spring when the Student Handbooks are approved for the 2011-12 school year.
“We’ve learned from colleges that when it comes to awarding scholarships our students are at a competitive disadvantage compared to students from other schools because of our grading scale.”
Currently it takes a 94 average to get an A at New Richmond and that puts the school’s graduates at a disadvantage compared to students graduating from schools using the traditional 90, 80, 70, 60 percent grading scale.
“We have surveyed other schools and we have found that many of them do have a grading scale like that,” said Bird. “So when our students get a 93 percent grade in a class it will show up as a B. If a student gets a 93 at Indian Hill, Anderson, Milford or Upper Arlington, it shows up as an A on their transcript.”
The new grading scale will include plus and minus grades and will be weighted for honors (college prep classes) and AP (advanced placement) classes.
“There’s a big difference between 90 and 99 percent,” said Bird. “We want to help the student who gets a 90, but when it comes to their GPA it’s going to show as a 3.7 which is higher than the 3.0 they receive under the old system. But it’s not as high as the 4.0 that the student who gets a 99 in the class will receive.”
The proposed grading scale will award a 3.7 GPA for 90-92 percent (A-) in a regular class and 4.0 for 93-96 (A) and 97-100 (A+). Students in honors classes will receive a 4.2 GPA for 90-92, and 4.5 GPA for grades of 93-96 and 97-100. Students taking AP courses would receive a 4.7 GPA for an A- and 5.0 for an A or A+.
“ Currently a student with a B in an AP class gets a 3.75 GPA and we know that a student getting a B in an AP class is working harder than a student in gym class and a student in gym class getting an A receives a 4.0,” said Bird.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Artreach makes stop at NRE
Brooke Olejniczak's afternoon New Richmond Elementary preschool class is pictured with the cast of Artreach of Cincinnati's 'The Fantastic Toy Shoppe'. Artreach of Cincinnati performed at NRE on the last day of school before the Christmas break.
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Happy Birthday Ralph Shepherd!
Ralph Shepherd, who never missed a meeting in his 20 years as a member of the New Richmond Board of Education, turned 80 Dec. 23. He was honored at Thursday's Liars Club meeting at New Richmond's McDonalds. Joining in honoring Mr. Shepherd (center) were State Sen. Tom Niehaus (left) and State Rep. Danny Bulp (right).
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Troubadours tour district with show
New Richmond High School's Troubadours made their 2010 Christmas Concert tour of disrict buildings on Wednesday.
Their stop at Monroe Elementary featured Monroe principal Mark Bailey and district elementary band director Jeff Folkens joined the Troubadours for the Hallelujah Chorus, playing piccolo trumpets.
Click on the picture below to watch the Troubadours' 2010 District Tour stop at Monroe Elementary.
Right click and choose Save Target As to download
Their stop at Monroe Elementary featured Monroe principal Mark Bailey and district elementary band director Jeff Folkens joined the Troubadours for the Hallelujah Chorus, playing piccolo trumpets.
Click on the picture below to watch the Troubadours' 2010 District Tour stop at Monroe Elementary.
Right click and choose Save Target As to download
Monday, December 20, 2010
Schools set record for food donations
Students at New Richmond schools and their families were in a giving mood this holiday season, donating a record 18,200 canned and non-perishable food items to the district’s annual food drive for the New Richmond Food Pantry.
“We helped 192 families Saturday, and could not have done it without NREVSD students and staff,” said Melinda Graser, president of the New Richmond Food Pantry. “More than 350 children are included in those 192 families.”
New Richmond High School led the way with a record 11,439 food items.
NRHS student council president Emily Smiddy (center right) and vice-president Myla Gordo (center left) are surrounded by volunteers from student council and Deron Shinkle's advanced drafting class who helped load the record 11,439 food items collected for the New Richmond Food Pantry.
“The high school student council would like to thank everyone for their donations to the food drive,” said NRHS student council adviser Jim Robinson. “In only 13 days, we collected 11,439 items including $1311.06 in monetary donations.”
Terri Flamm's physical education class set an all-time overall record for a class with 2896 items; John Callebs’ math class collected 2419, and the special education classes along with the office staff, graduation academy, teacher academy and library collected 2093 items. A combined effort by the classes of Sue Griffin and Jaime Kipfer collected 1895 items.
“We had a goal to top our previous record of 6975 and we easily topped that by over 4400,” said Robinson.
All New Richmond buildings reported donations of more than 1000 items with Locust Corner Elementary collecting 2479 items, Monroe Elementary 2194 items and New Richmond Elementary 1600.
More than 50 volunteers, including present and past students of the New Richmond High School and members of the New Richmond Liars Club, helped deliver, sort and box the food items which were distributed on Dec. 18 at the American Legion Hall in New Richmond.
“The volunteers filled 210 boxes and what we didn’t give out to the 192 families will go on our shelves for distribution for the rest of the month,” said Graser, who is the building secretary at New Richmond Middle School. “The schools probably contributed 95 percent of the items we will give out this year. A tremendous thank you to everyone.”
The New Richmond Food Pantry is in its 30th year. Other Pantry officers are Tom Marck, vice president, and Sonia Kroger, treasurer.
NRHS students (from left) John Channels, Dominic Steelman and Jacob Crooker take a break from loading the 11,349 food items onto a truck supplied by Duke Energy for transport to the New Richmond Food Pantry. (Photos by Jim Robinson)
“We helped 192 families Saturday, and could not have done it without NREVSD students and staff,” said Melinda Graser, president of the New Richmond Food Pantry. “More than 350 children are included in those 192 families.”
New Richmond High School led the way with a record 11,439 food items.
NRHS student council president Emily Smiddy (center right) and vice-president Myla Gordo (center left) are surrounded by volunteers from student council and Deron Shinkle's advanced drafting class who helped load the record 11,439 food items collected for the New Richmond Food Pantry.“The high school student council would like to thank everyone for their donations to the food drive,” said NRHS student council adviser Jim Robinson. “In only 13 days, we collected 11,439 items including $1311.06 in monetary donations.”
Terri Flamm's physical education class set an all-time overall record for a class with 2896 items; John Callebs’ math class collected 2419, and the special education classes along with the office staff, graduation academy, teacher academy and library collected 2093 items. A combined effort by the classes of Sue Griffin and Jaime Kipfer collected 1895 items.
“We had a goal to top our previous record of 6975 and we easily topped that by over 4400,” said Robinson.
All New Richmond buildings reported donations of more than 1000 items with Locust Corner Elementary collecting 2479 items, Monroe Elementary 2194 items and New Richmond Elementary 1600.
More than 50 volunteers, including present and past students of the New Richmond High School and members of the New Richmond Liars Club, helped deliver, sort and box the food items which were distributed on Dec. 18 at the American Legion Hall in New Richmond.
“The volunteers filled 210 boxes and what we didn’t give out to the 192 families will go on our shelves for distribution for the rest of the month,” said Graser, who is the building secretary at New Richmond Middle School. “The schools probably contributed 95 percent of the items we will give out this year. A tremendous thank you to everyone.”
The New Richmond Food Pantry is in its 30th year. Other Pantry officers are Tom Marck, vice president, and Sonia Kroger, treasurer.
NRHS students (from left) John Channels, Dominic Steelman and Jacob Crooker take a break from loading the 11,349 food items onto a truck supplied by Duke Energy for transport to the New Richmond Food Pantry. (Photos by Jim Robinson)
Thursday, December 16, 2010
School Board meeting rescheduled
Thursday's New Richmond Board of Education meeting scheduled to be held at Locust Corner Elementary has been cancelled and rescheduled for Dec. 23 at 5 p.m. at the Board office at the Market Street School.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
NRE exceeds food drive goal
Hans & Franz (AKA NRE principal Gary Combs and PE teacher John Bagley) returned to NRE's televisions for another appeal for food items for the school's 2010 Food Pantry drive, which has exceeded the school's goal of 1000 items.
New Richmond superintendent Adam Bird makes a guest appearance in this episode.
Click on the photo below to watch this week's televised appeal.
New Richmond superintendent Adam Bird makes a guest appearance in this episode.
Click on the photo below to watch this week's televised appeal.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
NREVSD featured in WKRC report
WKRC television's Rich Jaffe featured a report on the station's Dec. 9 newscast on the challenges New Richmond faces in replacing up to 1/3rd of its budget by 2016 when $8.1 million annual state utility de-regulation payments are scheduled to stop. Superntendent Adam Bird and New Richmond Elementary teachers Bridget Bell and David Smith are interviewed.
Click on the play button on the video screen below to watch the feature.
Click on the play button on the video screen below to watch the feature.
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Board receives financial plan
New Richmond’s Board of Education has been presented with a plan to use attrition and ask district voters to approve a future capital improvement levy to offset the projected loss of $8.1 million the New Richmond Exempted Village Schools will experience after 2016 due to Ohio’s deregulation of electrical utilities.
The contingency plan, submitted by New Richmond superintendent Adam Bird at a combined school board work session and meeting of the district’s Financial Planning Committee Dec. 6, anticipates savings of $4.7 million per year by 2017 by not replacing 35 teachers and 14 support staff personnel expected to retire in the next five years.
Click here to read the plan
The plan received the endorsement of the financial planning committee, which includes Scott Henderson, Jeanie Williams and Joe Middeler from the New Richmond business community, and parents Laura Jones, Rich Grogan and Mark Miller. Bird and the committee were asked to come up with recommendations by the board’s January meeting.
When Ohio deregulated electrical utilities in 2001 and reduced their assessed value from 88 to 25 percent, the state began taxing utilities on a kilowatt per hour basis and agreed to share that revenue with affected school districts for 15 years in the form of deregulation payments.
“This plan was born out of necessity,” said Bird. “These changes are being considered because of our financial forecast.”
The plan is based on a district retirement survey made in September. Bird noted that there’s no guarantee there will be the number of retirements anticipated and for that reason he included a reduction in force (RIF) clause in each year of the 5-year plan.
“A reduction in force will be used if anticipated retirements do not occur,” said Bird.
The plan also calls for a change in school day starts in 2011-12 to make the transportation department more efficient, changing Locust Corner Elementary and Monroe Elementary into P-4 buildings and New Richmond Elementary into a grade 5-6 building in the 2014-15 school year and go to a three-tier busing system and discussing a permanent improvement levy with the community in the next five years.
“Attrition is the way to go,” noted board member Kevin Walriven, who pointed to reductions of $2,272,474 in operating expenses over the past 10 years with the reduction of 25 positions due to attrition. “When you RIF you don’t lose the experienced teacher, you lose a beginning teacher.”
Since 2001 New Richmond schools have reduced administrators from 16 to 12, classroom teachers from 179 to 163 and classroom support staff from 41 to 36.
If all the retirements materialize over the next five years, New Richmond will need to transfer teachers based on their certification to fill openings.
New Richmond also faces a possible additional loss of $1.4 million per year should Duke Energy prevail in its request to the state to have the value of its non-generating property (meters, poles, substations) lowered.
A 5 mil permanent improvement levy could be considered in the next five years and would generate $2.5 million annually to be used to maintain school facilities, purchase computers, buses and textbooks, and capital expenditures.
The changes in planned spending and increased revenue of $7.2 million over 5 years will come to within $2.3 million in managing the 2016 shortfall in revenue.
Bird said the second phase of the plan to address the remaining $2.3 shortfall will be addressed by examining every appropriation to make sure it is essential, continue to lobby legislators to replace deregulation payments with additional kilowatt tax revenue funding, and to closely monitor the State Foundation Program as it develops in the biennium budgeting process.
“There will be three Ohio biennium budgets, two presidential elections and another gubernatorial election before that decision is necessary,” said Bird.
Ohio’s biennial budget could become a problem long before 2016.
Ohio faces an $8 billion shortfall in its next biennium budget in June and governor-elect John Kasich has said the shortfall will be made by budget cuts. The cuts may mean a 10 to 20 percent cut in state aid to schools. New Richmond receives 15 percent of its current $26 million in revenue from the state, compared to 43 percent for Batavia, 57 percent for Goshen and 66 percent for Bethel.
“What was once an asset of having two power stations in the school district could become a liability to the community in 2017,” said Bird. “The assessed value of the generating plants inflates the total value of the school district upon which school foundation payments are based and the district receives less state aid.”
The contingency plan, submitted by New Richmond superintendent Adam Bird at a combined school board work session and meeting of the district’s Financial Planning Committee Dec. 6, anticipates savings of $4.7 million per year by 2017 by not replacing 35 teachers and 14 support staff personnel expected to retire in the next five years.
Click here to read the plan
The plan received the endorsement of the financial planning committee, which includes Scott Henderson, Jeanie Williams and Joe Middeler from the New Richmond business community, and parents Laura Jones, Rich Grogan and Mark Miller. Bird and the committee were asked to come up with recommendations by the board’s January meeting.
When Ohio deregulated electrical utilities in 2001 and reduced their assessed value from 88 to 25 percent, the state began taxing utilities on a kilowatt per hour basis and agreed to share that revenue with affected school districts for 15 years in the form of deregulation payments.
“This plan was born out of necessity,” said Bird. “These changes are being considered because of our financial forecast.”
The plan is based on a district retirement survey made in September. Bird noted that there’s no guarantee there will be the number of retirements anticipated and for that reason he included a reduction in force (RIF) clause in each year of the 5-year plan.
“A reduction in force will be used if anticipated retirements do not occur,” said Bird.
The plan also calls for a change in school day starts in 2011-12 to make the transportation department more efficient, changing Locust Corner Elementary and Monroe Elementary into P-4 buildings and New Richmond Elementary into a grade 5-6 building in the 2014-15 school year and go to a three-tier busing system and discussing a permanent improvement levy with the community in the next five years.
“Attrition is the way to go,” noted board member Kevin Walriven, who pointed to reductions of $2,272,474 in operating expenses over the past 10 years with the reduction of 25 positions due to attrition. “When you RIF you don’t lose the experienced teacher, you lose a beginning teacher.”
Since 2001 New Richmond schools have reduced administrators from 16 to 12, classroom teachers from 179 to 163 and classroom support staff from 41 to 36.
If all the retirements materialize over the next five years, New Richmond will need to transfer teachers based on their certification to fill openings.
New Richmond also faces a possible additional loss of $1.4 million per year should Duke Energy prevail in its request to the state to have the value of its non-generating property (meters, poles, substations) lowered.
A 5 mil permanent improvement levy could be considered in the next five years and would generate $2.5 million annually to be used to maintain school facilities, purchase computers, buses and textbooks, and capital expenditures.
The changes in planned spending and increased revenue of $7.2 million over 5 years will come to within $2.3 million in managing the 2016 shortfall in revenue.
Bird said the second phase of the plan to address the remaining $2.3 shortfall will be addressed by examining every appropriation to make sure it is essential, continue to lobby legislators to replace deregulation payments with additional kilowatt tax revenue funding, and to closely monitor the State Foundation Program as it develops in the biennium budgeting process.
“There will be three Ohio biennium budgets, two presidential elections and another gubernatorial election before that decision is necessary,” said Bird.
Ohio’s biennial budget could become a problem long before 2016.
Ohio faces an $8 billion shortfall in its next biennium budget in June and governor-elect John Kasich has said the shortfall will be made by budget cuts. The cuts may mean a 10 to 20 percent cut in state aid to schools. New Richmond receives 15 percent of its current $26 million in revenue from the state, compared to 43 percent for Batavia, 57 percent for Goshen and 66 percent for Bethel.
“What was once an asset of having two power stations in the school district could become a liability to the community in 2017,” said Bird. “The assessed value of the generating plants inflates the total value of the school district upon which school foundation payments are based and the district receives less state aid.”
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