will welcome pupils
on Monday morning
Jackson set to
open new school
Elms Elementary
will welcome pupils
on Monday morning
By joyce blay
Staff Writer
The new Elms Elementary School on Patterson Road, Jackson, is scheduled to open its doors to students for the first time when public school children start classes this fall.
"We’re all looking forward to that," said Superintendent of Schools Thomas Gialanella.
That day will happen for Elms students and all other children attending the district’s other elementary and middle schools on Monday.
"We wanted a few more days to prepare the Switlik [school] site, so it was decided last May to extend the date for the start of classes to Sept. 8," said Allison Erwin, a spokesperson for the district.
Jackson Memorial High School students will return to class on Sept. 5.
A formal dedication ceremony for the new Elms school will be held on Sept. 30, according to information posted on the district’s Internet Web site.
The Elms Elementary School was one of four construction projects approved by voters in a referendum held in 2002. The referendum also provided funding for the construction of gymnasiums at the Switlik School on West Veterans Highway and the Lucy N. Holman School on Manhattan Street.
"The Holman school gym is nearly complete," said Erwin. "Before the construction of both gyms, the schools’ cafeterias doubled as a gym and a cafeteria."
The Switlik School was opened in 1948, while the Holman School was opened in 1969.
Ground was broken for a new high school earlier this summer, but litigation filed by a company that submitted an unsuccessful bid for the project may delay its construction beyond fall 2005, said Erwin.
The referendum also provided funding for land on which to build a new middle school, if and when one becomes necessary.
"It’s a matter of determining what our future enrollment will be and how to handle that," she said.
The future directions committee will include former members, who may also be on the school board, but the district will also be reaching out to the public for those who wish to serve on it. Anyone interested is requested to contact Allison Erwin at (732) 833-4618 or at [email protected].
Jackson’s overall population is growing and many of the people moving in have children who will be enrolled in the public schools.
Erwin said the current enrollment is approximately 9,469 children. The number of students enrolled in Jackson’s elementary schools, K-5, is 4,437; middle school enrollment is 2,288; and high school enrollment is 2,744. However, Erwin cautioned that those figures could change by the start of class.
The Board of Education approved a redistricting plan this past spring to more evenly distribute enrollment.
Funding has been provided for one new program that will enable students to study Latin as a foreign language course online.
Erwin did not have information available on enrollment for the course, but said this is the first time the course would be offered or is being taught in this way.
At a board meeting this spring, Lu Anne Meinders, assistant superintendent of schools, said the Latin course would strengthen students’ verbal skills and better prepare them to take tests for admission to institutions of higher learning.
Several new programs will also be introduced through grant funding awarded over the summer.
Jackson is the only district in Ocean County to receive a $750,000 federal grant for the three-year Reading First program. The program’s purpose is to support proven methods of early reading instruction in K-3 classrooms.
"This competitive grant is something we are very excited about," Gialanella said in a press release provided by Erwin. "It will enable us to supplement our literacy curriculum to provide more individualized attention to the diagnosis and remediation of literacy problems."
Through the grant money provided by the award, the district will be able to have a literacy coach and supervisor available to assist teachers and principals better diagnose literacy problems and begin early intervention. The grant will also fund additional materials for literacy programs and includes an intensive staff development plan to better enable staff members to help students.
A Perkins Grant, which is also provided by the federal government, will fund the district’s workplace readiness programs. Some of the $90,000 that will be available over a three-year period has already been earmarked for the purchase of additional equipment for the high school’s Computer Assisted Design (CAD) class.
Students in Steven Graziano’s CAD class will use the equipment to continue a project to design floor plans for the district’s middle schools and high schools. His class last year completed floor plans for each of the elementary schools. The plans will be included in the district’s emergency action plan on file with the Office of Emergency Management.
A grant from the Milken Festival for Youth Program will create programs to help students and older adults work together.