School board votes to spend $100K to put text books in two low-performing schools
By Joey Pitchford
Published in News on October 2, 2017 8:06 PM
The Wayne County Board of Education voted to allocate $100,000 for textbooks at Brogden Primary and Brogden Middle schools at its meeting Monday evening, with the money to come out of the shared pool of textbook funding for the entire county.
Board member Len Henderson first proposed allocating the money at the board's September work session. Given the schools low-performing status ---- both were briefly considered for state takeover ---- and the low-performing status of Southern Wayne High School, which they feed in to, Henderson said in September that Brogden Primary and Brogden Middle were in particular need of aid. The additional money would give students at those schools books in math, English and language arts to take home with them, in addition to their classroom copies.
On Monday, other members of the board agreed on the importance of having the books, but had concerns on details of where the money should come from. Chairman Arnold Flowers initially said he was willing to give the idea a chance, but said so under the notion that money would come from the district's local fund balance as opposed to its remaining $400,000 county-wide textbook funding allotment. He, along with board members Jennifer Strickland, Chris West and Rick Pridgen were hesitant to remove money from the shared pool, which would be used to supplement textbook needs at every other school in the county.
Doing so would reduce overall per-student spending for remaining schools from around $20 per student to around $17 per student, said assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction Tamara Ishee.
Strickland said the decision was tough for her to make, as getting textbooks in the hands of students has been a particular focus for her during her time on the board. She said that textbook funding would be best served at the middle school level.
"We do have a lot of schools in great need of take-home textbooks," she said. "I, especially now having children in middle and elementary, would like to see this at Brogden Middle and another middle school."
Board member Raymond Smith Jr. said the issue was a no-brainer.
"This board did not hesitate in voting to spend thousands of dollars to put mobile classrooms at Tommy's Road, and now we're talking about an academic issue where we could actually help our students, not a facility issue," he said. "I don't understand the consternation as to where the money is coming from opposed to what it's going for. We're the board of education, not the board of facilities."
Some schools, including Brogden Primary and Brogden Middle, chose not to use previously allocated money to purchase textbooks. Instead, they often focused on personnel, hiring tutors and other staff to help students.
Henderson made a motion to allocate the funds, using money from the textbook allotment to pay for it. The motion passed 4-2, with Henderson, Pridgen, Smith and board member Patricia Burden voting for it while West and Strickland voted against. Flowers did not cast a vote.