Sunnyside Intermediate School fourth- and fifth-graders quickly scramble grab their coats and backpacks down a crowded hallway as the school day ends Wednesday afternoon.
Havre Public Schools’ boost in kindergarten students luckily happened right after Highland Park Early Primary School finished some renovations, but now the district has to look at where those students are going to be headed.
At Tuesday night’s school board meeting, Sunnyside Intermediate School Principal Marlin Lewis showed and told the trustees about the need for space in his building and what the district is just now doing about it.
The district has received a $25,000 planning grant from the Montana Department of Commerce to look into giving Havre’s fourth- and fifth-graders a bit more room.
Superintendent Andy Carlson said the grant is “very similar” to the grant that funded the planning of the Highland Park work a few years ago.
Thomas, Dean and Hoskins, the engineering firm behind the Havre High School roof repair and upgrade, are working on making the building a little roomier, which Carlson said is desperately needed.
“We have classrooms with 48 people in them at a time, ” Carlson said.
“We just have no space. ”
Lewis showed the trustees photos taken in the school of students having to study in the hallways and said the gym is also the cafeteria and music classes are taught in the school library.
Carlson said the entry way and front office areas are frequently uncomfortably cramped, which he’d like to change, with “maybe a little more welcoming place for families and kids getting off the bus. It’s kind of like a chute instead of an entry area. ”
He added that this process is still in its early days and that the district is “a long ways away from any dirt being moved. ”
While the unexpectedly large kindergarten class will have to pass through Lincoln-McKinley Primary School first, Carlson said certain limitations made Sunnyside the school to upgrade, including a state safety law that first- and second-grade students can’t be placed on a second floor.
Carlson said the district will be watching how big the next few classes will be. If they continue to stay as big as this year’s, or even grow further, Carlson said the district will have to consider its options, like possibly reorganizing which classes are in which buildings in town.
Otherwise, Carlson said, “if you don’t see the large classes behind (these), adjustments might just have to be for a few years. ”
Japan is also in 5th place life expectancy out of 221 countries.
The U.S. is in 50th place in life expectancy. How can that be?
Japan is mostly into homeopathic and their students are under immense stress to excell and we, in the past have been led to believe that has shortened their lifespan etc. Not so. The info about life expectancies is on the CIA information web site. google it.
Hmmmmm perhaps it isn't the space we occupy but the need for moderate discipline and expectations.
I have to share a little story. I was in another Montana town a couple weeks ago and toured a non denominational Christian school 1st through high school. I was headed into the main office and slowed to hold the main door for a high school student behind me a ways.
He actually said: "Thank you for holding the door for me." Hey, I'm serious. I was shocked and the students were not unruly in the halls and they seemed to respect each other also. I went away feeling kind of weird if you want to know the truth. Pleasantly weird and do I admire that administration. Our public schools are or have become a pig sty of dis-respect for adults and other students. I suspect our public schools may be the most dis-respectful in the whole world but do not have actual proof of that. Close though.
We need to do something about all this mess.
We spend more money on medical than any other country in the whole world and we are only 50th in life expectancy. ???? Now what do you suppose that means??? As a nation we need to get a life. (No pun intended here either) What can we do??? Form a committee to oversee the other committees??? and report to a committee chairman to study the situation??? It isn't the space in the schools. It isn't the money being spent... It's the attitude and it's not just the students attitude. We are teaching our students they have to go onto college and only 20% do so therefore the other 80% don't get hardly any education by the time they are age 18. We need to educate the 80% so they can get a job after high school rather than having them start from scratch at age 18.
Now that school I was talking about earlier. They are teaching electronics starting in the 7th grade through high school. Can you imagine right here in Montana. The 7th graders design and build a power supply and amplifier before the end of the first semester.
Watch out Japan........ Soon more and more parents will be sending their children to private schools where they either behave or they can't stay. It will be worth the extra $5000 per year.
This can all be turned around however it takes an administration who get off their tails and make it happen. You can't force respect. You get respect by giving it to each other.
Good luck