Town of Lenox, Massachusetts

Town of Lenox Annual Town Report - 2008
the cafeteria and riding the “B Bus.” Students may have internships in the community,
including in the Morris preschool. Students from the general population volunteer in
the program as peer mentors and teacher assistants in the Life Skills Program. This
arrangement not only allows for modeling of positive social skills and interactions, it
also helps to foster friendships, and decrease stigma for all involved.
The Life Skills Program is involved with Community Access to the Arts
(CATA) in Great Barrington. Our Life Skills teacher also serves as Vice President on
the Board of Directors for this organization. Each year, the culmination of this
experience is a gala performance, which is held at Founder’s Theatre in May and is
typically sold out. This program encourages participants to develop their artistic
skills, self-confidence, communication skills and teamwork while allowing our students
to interact and socialize with others from various schools and group homes. We
also have one student involved with a dance class one day per week and another student
who is part of CATA direct, an employment opportunity. We are fortunate that
we have been able to have our students involved with CATA.
The special education department continues to support in-service training to
all faculty members. Staff training and consultation is designed to assist all personnel
in programming for students with various learning styles and needs. Over the
summer, members of the Lenox special needs department and several regular education
teachers participated in training that focused on new state procedures regarding
identification of students with specific learning disabilities. We have continued training
in curriculum-based measurement (CBM) and using general outcome measurement
(GOM) to write measurable IEP goals and objectives. There has also been an
emphasis on working with students who fall on the autism spectrum with staff members
as well as with outside consultants. Training is made possible through the use of
state and federal grant funds in addition to local funds.
LENOX PUBLIC SCHOOLS
Financial Expenditures
The following is a summary of the actual appropriation and expenditures for 2007-2008:
Program Budget Actual Expenditures
Elementary Education 2,012,510 2,020,713
Secondary Education 3,741,887 3,680,773
Special Education 1,303,526 1,404,358
Other School Services 13,375 11,281
Administration/Support Services 780,035 662,563
Operations/Maintenance 958,458 979,742
8,809,791 8,759,430
93