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Riley Scott
11.06.17
On Nov. 7, residents within the Athens City School District will vote for three candidates to serve on the school board starting in 2018. Here’s a breakdown of each candidate’s platform:
Laura Alloway, director of marketing and communications for Ohio University’s Voinovich School of Leadership and Public Affairs, moved to Athens in 2011 from Columbus. She has two daughters, ages 8 and 11, who both attend West Elementary.
Alloway grew up in a large school environment, what she called a “big box education,” where she said students traveled anonymously through the school system. She did not want the same thing for her children and found Athens to be an ideal situation.
“We could bring our kids into the school system where they would have not only an excellent educational opportunity, but also that opportunity to be in that really small and intimate environment,” Alloway said.
The discussions about consolidation are not the discussion Alloway thinks the district should have. Alloway believes instead of consolidation, the district should start from the beginning with its planning process.
Small class sizes, Alloway believes, are the best way to help students succeed, which is why the district should keep its current kindergarten through sixth grade setup.
“Small schools, small class sizes, the mentorship opportunities — there's just multiple advantages to maintaining our current K through sixth system,” Alloway said.
Kim Goldsberry, a current board member, attended Morrison-Gordon Elementary, Athens Middle School and Athens High School before studying communication at OU. She has twins who attend Athens Middle School and a daughter who attends Athens High School. All three previously attended East Elementary.
She has served as both president and vice president of the East Elementary Parent Teacher Organization. Goldsberry said she was involved in improving student safety with better security measures at East Elementary, better traffic patterns at Athens High School and more crosswalks near Athens Middle School.
Goldsberry said she worked to increase security at the elementary school and then worked with a safety committee to improve security after the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012.
Goldsberry ran for the board and won in 2013, and she began her term in 2014. During her time on the board, she said the board has made tough financial decisions, tried to not micro-manage what happens within the schools and evaluated the current facilities.
If re-elected, Goldsberry said she would like to look into grant funded afterschool programs that have been implemented at Hilliard Schools near Columbus, as well as “power hours” that would help students struggling with reading.
Paul Grippa has lived in Athens since 1986, when he came to the district to be principal of the Athens Middle School, a position he held for 28 years. Grippa said he also served as interim superintendent for the district from 1995 to 1996. Grippa had nine children go through the district.
Grippa said his time in the district has helped him become familiar with nearly every issue and all the buildings and some of their limitations. He believes the issues that could come up have always been issues, facilities being the exception.
In his opinion, the district needs to determine if there are enough or too many buildings, rate the quality of all the buildings from top to bottom and figure out which buildings, if any, need repair. Grippa said the board must address the state of the facilities.
“If there are buildings that can be continued to be used, then I think we have an obligation to continue to use these buildings and have them be preserved,” Grippa said.
He thinks the board's role is to be a body that oversees and determines policy. Grippa also said the board has to constantly work to find the most efficient way to balance its budget so money is being spent efficiently.
David Hayden, owner of Museum Data Solutions, has lived in Athens with his family for 12 years. He has a son who attends East Elementary and a daughter who attends Athens Middle School.
Hayden said he became more involved four years ago when he became part of Athens Parents for Participation, a Facebook group of parents focused on having stronger communication between the administration and parents. As of this school year, the group is nearing 600 members.
Hayden hopes that, by running, he could get more voices engaged to discuss issues in the communities, such as facilities, so a common ground could be found.
Hayden also wants to address disparity in the district. He thinks the current footprint with four elementary schools makes providing services inefficient. He would like the district to look at programming and helping students understand how they could get involved in extracurricular activities. He would also like to do an assessment and more long-term planning.
Something Hayden would like to introduce to the district is the idea of standing committees. Years ago, Hayden said, the board used to have standing committees made up of school board members, staff, administration, parents and residents to address specific issues in the district.
Jenny Klein, assistant dean for student success and persistence at OU, and her family have lived in Athens since 2005. Kline said she “really appreciates” the education all three of her daughters received at East Elementary.
Her motivation to run was the inequity she noticed in the district. She wants to keep schools small so children can be “known and nurtured.”
“When a child walks by a teacher, that should not be an anonymous relationship,” Klein said. “That should be a teacher that knows that kid and that is looking at each and every one of those kids and looking out for them.”
Her plan for having children be “known and nurtured” in small schools and create equity is to investigate redistricting, look at the strategic plan and determine what facilities need renovation or rebuilding firsts.
Klein also said collaboration and communication are two areas she would hope to improve on the board. She thinks the board should be seeking more input from all stakeholders.
“We did not elect these five people to think for themselves,” Klein said. “We elected these five people to represent us. Representing us means they need to hear from us.”
Mentorship programs, such as fourth grade reading buddies, are important to the district, Klein believes, and she wants to keep the kindergarten through sixth grade setup.
Bruce Nottke, a current school board member, has served on the board for 16 years and also served on the Ohio School Boards Association, the South East Region Executive Committee and Ohio Self Determination Association Board of Trustees. He and his family have lived in Athens since 1973. Both of his children completed their educations in the district.
Nottke would like to add more programs to the district, but knows that costs more money. Regarding that cost, Nottke said the old facilities cost the district money, and if the district could stop spending money on all the facilities, then there could be money made available for new programs.
The board, Nottke said, has one agenda, and that is to give the kids in the Athens City School District the best education it can. He hopes to continue to improve the district if re-elected with more things for the kids, as well as to better their educations.
“We've tried to do the best that we can to give the students as much and the best we can with the resources that we have,” Nottke said. “I have supported that all along, and it will always be that the students education will always be number one with me.”
Sean Parsons, an assistant professor at OU’s School of Music, is the father of two children who both attend Morrison-Gordon Elementary. He was a member of the steering committee that developed the three facilities options proposed to the board.
Parsons is recognized throughout the school district for videos he produced that explained what the Athens City School District Board of Education was discussing, especially about the facilities options from the steering committee. He said he created those videos to demonstrate how he would communicate as a board member.
Special needs services and supporting teachers are two aspects of the district Parsons is focused on. The wide range in the district in special needs services is something Parsons believes there is a “societal obligation” to address.
Rather than telling teachers what to do, he would want teachers to tell him what they would want, and he would try to support it. Throughout his campaign, Parsons said he has gone into classrooms in different buildings in the district to see how they were maintained and hopes to do something similar if he becomes a board member.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly spelled Bruce Nottke's name. The article has been updated to reflect the most accurate information.
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