and Strategic Initiatives 2008–2009 - Laramie County School District ...

Governance & Leadership
Board of Education
2008–09 Board
of Trustees
Dear LCSD1 Community,
This past November brought two new
Board members, Hank Bailey and Glenn
Garcia to our team. I’d also like to thank
voters for returning Bob Farwell and myself
to the Board. We appreciate your interest and
support as the seven of us, plus our superintendent,
continue to move LCSD1 from a
good district to a great one!
As a Board, it is our job to hire the superintendent,
establish district policy and administer
a budget, which in 2007–08 totaled
$357,716,525. The general operation funds
were $157,445,927 and the remaining funds
went to new or renovated facilities, special
grants, nutrition services, student activity
funds and other restricted uses.
The vision, mission, goals and core values
we have adopted for this district are the
driving force behind all we do. They are
included later in this report card. The District’s
2008–09 Strategic Plan is our roadmap
for the current year. Highlighting it are four
areas: leadership development, strategic communication,
data-driven decision making and
curriculum and instruction. The biggest challenge
of these is building a data warehouse
system to help us better track/monitor every
student and assess achievement, interventions
and successes. This “roadmap” helps us
to always work toward our district goals that
all students will improve in: math problem
solving, reading comprehension and writing
across the content areas and the percentage
of students graduating from LCSD1 will
increase from the previous year.
In 2007–08 the Cheyenne Community
Recreation Mill collected $665,902 and its
Board distributed these funds throughout the
district and community. It funded projects
like playground equipment at eight elementary
schools—Clawson, Dildine, Fairview-
Lebhart, Alta Vista, Goins, Jessup, Willadson
and Anderson. It also funded a basketball
court and a backstop at Pioneer Park, football
and soccer goals, elliptical machines at
East and Central, swimming pool lane lines,
discus cages, and a tractor, top dresser, aerator
and striping machine for our facility management
department. As you can see this county
recreation mill levy is put to good use and is a
great asset to our community.
Innovative interventions for all students are
at work in every school. For the first time in
summer school, an enrichment science, math
and language arts program was implemented.
A wide variety of seventh- and eighth-graders
participated in this project-based discovery
curriculum. This was made possible through
a one-time grant funded by our state legislature,
which we hope they will do again.
Another example of an intervention took
place this fall through the K–12 online school
program, which was offered mostly for homeschooled
students. These parents, students
and administrators have now brought this
before the Board in the form of a charter
school application. It will have to meet or
exceed the state statutes for a charter school.
This statute states a charter school’s purposes
need to include: improving student learning,
increasing learning opportunities through
expanded learning experiences, encouraging
the use of different and innovative teaching
methods, creating new professional opportunities
for teachers, and providing parents and
pupils with expanded choices in the types of
educational opportunities that are available.
We will be as diligent, professional and thorough
with this application as we were with
the Cheyenne Classical Academy’s application
a year ago.
Your Board continually works to improve
LCSD1 through accountability, professional
development, improved facilities, data collection,
reporting in a strategic pattern and our
accessibility to this community. As we make
decisions we always keep the education of
13,000 students foremost in our minds.
We welcome your involvement and attendance
at district events and facilities, and
hope to see you soon in our ever-improving
district!
Jan Stalcup
LCSD1 Chairman of the Board
Jan Stalcup—Chairman
Bob Farwell—Vice Chairman
Anne Beckle—Clerk
Al Atkins—Assistant Clerk
Brian Farmer—Treasurer
Glenn Garcia—Assist. Treasurer
Hank Bailey—Trustee
4 • Report Card 2007–2008 www.laramie1.org