
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, October 11, 1994                   TAG: 9410110114
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI                                 LENGTH: Medium

PULASKI BOARD TO HEAR ABOUT TEACHING INITIATIVES|

The Pulaski County School Board will get reports Thursday night on two of its educational initiatives, the Critical Years-Critical Skills program and the math, science and technology demonstration school within Dublin Elementary School.

The Critical Years-Critical Skills program started this year. It will phase in smaller classes at lower grade levels and assessments to make sure students master skills needed later.

Preassessments for the program were administered last month and will be used to make instructional decisions. The results will help teachers determine where student strengths and weaknesses are.

Teachers, principals and central office personnel are working together to refine the assessment part of the program, and seek ways to use information gained through the preassessments to improve instruction.

Isabel Berney, the school system's director of research, media and technology, will update the board on the demonstration school.

The board will also hear about computerized report cards for elementary schools, starting with the first nine-week report this year.

The format and content are being kept as close as possible to previous report cards. Where space restrictions made it necessary to change wording, principals and central office staff sought new phrases that conveyed the intent of the skill being taught.

Jim Sandidge, manager of information systems, is conducting in-service training at each school this month to familiarize teachers with entering grades into the computer. Principals will conduct a dry run Oct. 31 to Nov. 4 to test the system, identify problems and allow teachers to check reports for accuracy.

Teacher comments will be handwritten directly on the computer-generated reports.

The computerization will allow grades to automatically become part of the student's cumulative record. Grade information will then be available to principals and central office staff when they make programming decisions and complete state reports.

The School Board will also consider an updated technology plan for county schools.

The proposed plan includes providing two multimedia stations for each school with more than 300 students and one each for smaller schools by March, budgeting an amount equal to 5 percent of the total school budget for technology in April, and updating the school system's hardware and software networks by July.

by CNB