By Cassie Walsh
Paris, Tenn.- At Thursday’s Henry County School System BOE, Family Resource Center DIrector Becky Holland updated the board about the Family Resource Center, which recently celebrated its 25th anniversary.
Holland said that this year was the first time they had medical referrals, which really helped. She said that one example of the medical referrals that worked included when the center made referrals for several Lakewood students who had failed vision and 92% of those students were prescribed eye glasses.
Holland said that the FRC in 2018-19 helped 375 students and saw an attendance rate of 71.2% with an 81.4% improvement in academics of students. She said the center not only helped students needs in academia and attendance, but they also help with students basic needs. The basic needs that the center helped including helping the family meet the needs of the child from helping pay for hygiene, electric bills, rent, clothing and more items that directly went to benefit the child and the family.
Holland said the center is 100% community served program and their Helping Hand and weekend backpack programs are in healthy states. She said the Family Resource had taken in $186,794.53 for the 2018-19 year from various partnerships and collaborations like the Salvation Army, Project Roundup from BPU, Helping Hand, and various churches and foundations. Those funds helped with volunteers for the weekend backpack program, Christmas food baskets and more.
“We’d like to see improvement in student attendance,” said Holland. “We’re very blessed in Henry County… being able to have the support we have to provide all that we can.”
Holland said that this year, they packed 407 grade appropriate school bags, which is all community funded. Holland said that she wanted to clarify some confusion about the Family Resource Center’s Back to School Blast and the Henry County Sheriff’s Department The Shed’s Back to School Bash.
Holland said the center is 100% community served program and their Helping Hand and weekend backpack programs are in healthy states. She said the Family Resource had taken in $186,794.53 for the 2018-19 year from various partnerships and collaborations like the Salvation Army, Project Roundup from BPU, Helping Hand, and various churches and foundations. Those funds helped with volunteers for the weekend backpack program, Christmas food baskets and more.
“We’d like to see improvement in student attendance,” said Holland. “We’re very blessed in Henry County… being able to have the support we have to provide all that we can.”
Holland said that this year, they packed 407 grade appropriate school bags, which is all community funded. Holland said that she wanted to clarify some confusion about the Family Resource Center’s Back to School Blast and the Henry County Sheriff’s Department The Shed’s Back to School Bash.
Holland said that the Family Resource Center’s Back to School Blast that will be held on Thursday, July 25th gives school supplies to both county and city children and they are still taking applications for the Back to School Blast.
In other business:
–The Read to Be Ready programs for the Henry County School System updated the board of education about how successful the program was for this summer.
Harrelson Principal Maria Cox along with teachers from Henry and Lakewood spoke to the board about the school system’s Read to Be Ready program.
Lakewood, Henry and Harrelson all participated in this year’s Read to Be Ready program that served rising first and second grade students. Harrelson students got the chance to explored Paris and Henry County. Students got to enjoy writing poems and other various. They also got to make things compost soup to show kids that they can use things again in another beneficial way. Students also got to make candles, soups and more items that they could use at home.
Henry Elementary School had 18 students that participated in the program, where each student got the chance to pick twenty-four books per child to take home that the child wanted and they felt connected too. Tactile and sensory aspects of the program helped students connect more with the books they were reading, which also helped students become excited about reading and learning.
Lakewood students learned about agriculture, had a weather week, learned about recycling. Teachers said that their goal was to help those students enjoy reading, while also helping them grow at the same time. On average the program had a 1 to 6 teacher-student ratio.
“You can see tonight all of the joy not just in our students, but in our teachers as well,” said HC Director of Schools Dr. Leah Watkins. “It’s important to know how the Read to Be Ready program impacts our students in the summer and how that carries over when our students head back to school. It’s a wonderful program.”
Statistics for all Read to Be Ready programs at Henry, Harrelson and Lakewood included high student attendance rates, and improved accuracy and reading confidence in the students. 90.8% student attendance. Comparing stats, students accuracy increased from 77.2% to 84.8%, motivation increased from 80.8 to 83.7 and confidence in reading increased from 79% to 80%. The program also helped students become more confident in reading out loud which increased from 71.8 to 78%.
Students in all three programs got to take various field trips to places like Land Between the Lakes and the W.G. Rhea Public Library along with taking home several books for the students to keep at home.
Director of Schools Dr. Leah Watkins said that the Read to Be Ready Program is funded through a grant from the state, but funding at the state level was cut for the program. Watkins emphasized how the program has had a positive impact on not just the students, but the teachers as well. Teachers stated that the funds for the R2BR program funded around $1,000 per student.
Facilities update:
Harrelson Principal Maria Cox along with teachers from Henry and Lakewood spoke to the board about the school system’s Read to Be Ready program.
Lakewood, Henry and Harrelson all participated in this year’s Read to Be Ready program that served rising first and second grade students. Harrelson students got the chance to explored Paris and Henry County. Students got to enjoy writing poems and other various. They also got to make things compost soup to show kids that they can use things again in another beneficial way. Students also got to make candles, soups and more items that they could use at home.
Henry Elementary School had 18 students that participated in the program, where each student got the chance to pick twenty-four books per child to take home that the child wanted and they felt connected too. Tactile and sensory aspects of the program helped students connect more with the books they were reading, which also helped students become excited about reading and learning.
Lakewood students learned about agriculture, had a weather week, learned about recycling. Teachers said that their goal was to help those students enjoy reading, while also helping them grow at the same time. On average the program had a 1 to 6 teacher-student ratio.
“You can see tonight all of the joy not just in our students, but in our teachers as well,” said HC Director of Schools Dr. Leah Watkins. “It’s important to know how the Read to Be Ready program impacts our students in the summer and how that carries over when our students head back to school. It’s a wonderful program.”
Statistics for all Read to Be Ready programs at Henry, Harrelson and Lakewood included high student attendance rates, and improved accuracy and reading confidence in the students. 90.8% student attendance. Comparing stats, students accuracy increased from 77.2% to 84.8%, motivation increased from 80.8 to 83.7 and confidence in reading increased from 79% to 80%. The program also helped students become more confident in reading out loud which increased from 71.8 to 78%.
Students in all three programs got to take various field trips to places like Land Between the Lakes and the W.G. Rhea Public Library along with taking home several books for the students to keep at home.
Director of Schools Dr. Leah Watkins said that the Read to Be Ready Program is funded through a grant from the state, but funding at the state level was cut for the program. Watkins emphasized how the program has had a positive impact on not just the students, but the teachers as well. Teachers stated that the funds for the R2BR program funded around $1,000 per student.
Facilities update:
Maintenance supervisor John Akers told the board that the construction projects at HCHS are moving along. He said that progress on the spring sports building, which will be used for baseball, softball and soccer, is moving along. Akers said that the first soccer game is going to held during the second week of August and crews are hoping to have the building completed by the second week of August so that the soccer team can get in there.
The roof and walls are up in the band building and plans are to have the steel erection for the fieldhouse completed by Friday. The fieldhouse will be entirely painted red. Akers said that the front entrance is currently not tied in to the existing building yet, but they hope to have the front entrance tied in to the high school by the middle of next week.
The roof and walls are up in the band building and plans are to have the steel erection for the fieldhouse completed by Friday. The fieldhouse will be entirely painted red. Akers said that the front entrance is currently not tied in to the existing building yet, but they hope to have the front entrance tied in to the high school by the middle of next week.
Director’s report:
“Thank you all for being here. It’s been a good week and I’m excited to see what we get to accomplish this year. It is so good to be home.” said Dr. Leah Watkins. “First day of school is August 2nd. We will be participating next Saturday, July 27th from 4-6:30 at the Downtown Paris Association’s Ice Cream Social.”
“Thank you all for being here. It’s been a good week and I’m excited to see what we get to accomplish this year. It is so good to be home.” said Dr. Leah Watkins. “First day of school is August 2nd. We will be participating next Saturday, July 27th from 4-6:30 at the Downtown Paris Association’s Ice Cream Social.”
–Susan Burton announced that the pre-kindergarten program received the five-year grant in the amount of $110,000, which is down from $145,000 but Burton said they can still pay the salaries for the program with the grant monies.
Betsy Allison, Director of Grades 9-12 Career and Technical Education, also announced at the board meeting that the school system received $83,000 in grant funding. Around $10,000 from the grant will be used for STEM in the middle schools, another $23,000 will be used for the renovation and development of a mobile STEM lab, $15,000 will be used for student certifications and $35,000 will be used for health science and STEM equipment.
Photo: Becky Holland of the Family Resource Center addresses the board (Cassie Walsh photo).