Teachers’ Contracts Renewed
The GCISD School Board (Mike Hillger absent) voted Mar. 7 to renew 21 teachers’ one-year term contracts. Four dual-term contracts (teaching/coaching) were also renewed. Three teachers were given probationary contracts, with one pending receipt of certification documentation. The athletic director/football coach’s two-year contract was not extended, and thereby it became a regular one-year term contract, which will be reviewed next spring, along with all other contracts.
The board voted to contract with the Texas Association of School Boards to receive online state updates regarding various rules and regulations. There will still be a paper copy available in the superintendent’s office. The service will cost $750 annually, plus a start-up charge of $1,200.
A state-required “Leaver Reporting Policy” was adopted, requiring that students in grades 7–12 who leave school be tracked to determine if they dropped out, moved to another school or graduated. This information will be reported to the state education agency.
The board decided to continue its current payment to teachers of concurrent enrollment classes, whereby students earn both high school credit and college credit at Howard College. Howard pays GCISD $115 per student enrolled concurrently and that money is passed on as a stipend to the GCISD teacher, who must have at least a Master’s degree to teach the classes. Textbooks are paid for with grant money and used from year to year, so long as they are current adoptions. Linda Jones and Rebecca Moore from GCHS’s staff teach the four concurrent classes here, which are junior English, senior English, Biology II and physics. Distance learning via computer is also offered for concurrent credit in both government and economics, with Howard College faculty teaching those classes. Three GCISD students are now enrolled in concurrent physics, 11 in English and 13 in government.
A school board election was called for May 3 and the board appointed Wanda Forbis, Ruth Cook, Deanie Craft and Joyce Halfmann election judges.
All textbooks approved by the selection committee were adopted for the 2003-04 school year.