On the first day of Waterville Central School’s Stay In the Game attendance challenge, every seventh grader came to school.
WCS Superintendent Dr. Jennifer said at last week’s Board of Education meeting that early results show improvement across the grade levels.
Junior-Senior High Principal Andre Paradis said the building has 25 teams of homerooms and grades competing for the prizes. Teams decorated their doors in one contest.
Paradis said attendance improvements will be based on changes from February attendance.
Of the 25 groups, 80 percent have seen an increase in attendance, with it reaching a high change of 10 percent in two rooms.
So far, grade 7 leads the six grade levels with 98.44 percent of students showing up.
Five of the six grade levels have increased attendance.
Students play a trivia game in homeroom.
A right answer earns them a raffle ticket toward the prizes.
Memorial Park School Principal Kathy Zangrilli said their attendance challenge is off to a good start.
For the first two weeks the focus is on building awareness of the importance of attending.
The end of the month will track attendance.
Spring also presented a draft of revising the student attendance policy that spells out how missing days can have consequences. “We’re trying to get to the root causes of students missing school and put supports in place,’’ she said.
Board member Tim Jones said parents and students need to be informed on the need for a better education for success in life, and how attendance impacts that goal.
A new regulation will create a system for guest speakers coming into the buildings to spell out their purpose.
Another new regulation will define how new student clubs can be established and set benchmarks for all clubs to remain active. These include a minimum membership and yearly activities.
Zangrilli said the production of ‘Annie’ by the elementary students was phenomenal and thanked the Junior-Senior High School cast of ‘Legally Blonde’ for attending. ...