BUCYRUS — A few issues were discussed at Thursday night’s Bucyrus Board of Education meeting.
To begin, Neely Young, the mother of two Bucyrus students, addressed the board with frustrations she and many other Bucyrus parents have regarding scheduling.
Young stated that her daughter was told with the schedule she wanted to have for the next year, she would have to take a college class online over the summers so that the schedule would allow for the classes she needed to graduate and the band classes she wanted.
Due to the district’s master schedule, Young’s one daughter will not be able to be in concert band, which eliminates her ability to be in Xband for her final year. Young stated that her family is not the only one experiencing this frustration with the master schedule, as she has talked to other parents about it.
Chrispin said that for the master schedule to be made, students were asked in January to fill out what classes they wanted to take, then all of that information was put into a program along with all classes provided, and the program will work out schedules so that the highest number of students possible get the schedule that they wanted — Bucyrus was able to get 85% of students into the schedule they wanted.
Several board members expressed interest and concern over the scheduling process — including asking about students having multiple study halls when there are other classes that could potentially take place during those times — past numbers of students who had scheduling conflicts, students needing classes for graduation that might conflict with certain other classes that they want to take, using teachers for their area of expertise (such as using a band director for band classes and not necessarily study halls), offering the same class with two different teachers so more kids can get into it, and concerns of several different teaching positions that led to less teachers and limiting opportunities for students in the classrooms.
Chrispin said that should Crawford County have a spike in COVID-19 cases and be bumped up to the orange level before the start of school on August 30, he wants the school to still operate under the yellow level of the back-to-school plan for at least two weeks in order for students and teachers to be more familiar with each other and to get a better feel for the school year so they aren’t trying to begin a new year online.
Should Crawford County be bumped up to the red level for any reason by the start of school, the school will operate under the orange/red level guidelines on the back-to-school plan. However, this has not been made official. The board is potentially looking at meeting to create an addendum if they were to put this in place.
The board decided that they will not begin discussion on the possibility of changing the school mascot until September when the school year is underway, and they’ve had more time to review options.
At the meeting, Chrispin announced that the high school was awarded the Comprehensive Literacy grant, and that the secondary school was awarded the 21st Century grant for $400,000 over the next couple years to provide after school tutoring and support for Bucyrus students.
To end the meeting, the board voted to approve Pepple & Waggoner Legal Counsel in addition to the two firms the school already uses.
The next meeting is scheduled for September 17.