Thanks for reading Fluco Blog!  I’m Perrie Johnson, Fork Union’s representative to the Fluvanna County School Board.  My goal with Fluco Blog is to let people know what’s going on at School Board meetings beyond the reports available online.  Be forewarned, when it comes to discussion, most of the comments I remember turn out to be mine!  Here’s the latest…

We talked a lot about money and not much about policy at December’s meeting, so this will be a short post.  (Merry Christmas)  I brought up two budget priorities for next year that aren’t listed in the online reports, that I hope the Board will consider.  I want to concentrate on improving our current class sizes before we look at adding new positions and programs.  According to the Va. Dept. Of Education website, Fluvanna’s pupil/teacher ratios are higher (that’s bad) than most of Virginia at the high school level, and they’re even worse at the elementary grades.  I think it’s time to bring these ratios down to at least average levels.

I also want to do something to help equalize planning time across all grade levels.  Teachers are given some time during the school day to prepare lessons, grade assignments, contact parents, attend meetings, and work on a million other requirements of the job.  High school and middle school teachers in Fluvanna have twice as much planning time as elementary teachers.  Our elementary students deserve teachers with enough daily planning time to be just as prepared as our middle and high school teachers.  (Of course they ARE just as prepared, but at the cost of taking even more time from their evenings and weekends.). One of my budget priorities would be to hire lunch and recess aides for the elementary schools.  Teachers would have a little more time for planning (not equal yet) and we would be paying less than teachers’ salaries to watch kids eat and play.  Plus, NO instructional time would be lost.  This wasn’t my idea, a teacher suggested it, and I’m sure staff could come up with lots of other ways to improve the situation.

With two new Board members starting in January, I’m looking forward to hearing their priorities, too!

 

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This blog is a personal blog, written and edited by me.  the views expressed in this blog are purely my own and do not represent the Fluvanna County School Board, the school superintendent, or anyone else.  Comments added by others are not necessarily my opinions and I am not responsible for their content.

 

 

 

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