Appomattox schools chief reflects on past year, prepares for challenges ahead

The superintendent for Appomattox County Public Schools gave an annual review to both the Appomattox School Board and Board of Supervisors on Monday evening, highlighting the county schools’ progression throughout the past year but also laying out the potential financial challenges they could face in the coming year.

“It seems like we will be doing more with less and that is a challenge,” Superintendent Dorinda Grasty said. “We’re going to make our best effort.”

At a joint meeting between the two bodies, Grasty cited the year’s structural achievements, which included the construction of new football, baseball and playing fields at Appomattox High School and the installation of a new roof at Appomattox Middle School.

She summarized the schools’ academic accomplishments and targeted areas for improvement.

Overall, Appomattox Elementary School maintained the highest SOL scores, averaging between 94 and 95 percent in all tested subjects.

Both Appomattox Middle School and High School fell short in the math portion of the SOLs, scoring in the low and mid-70s.

Annette Bennett, director of curriculum and instruction, spoke at the meeting, saying there would be a renewed focus on math in order to better prepare students for that portion of SOL examinations.

“We want to identify what the issues are and fix those,” she said.

School board member Bobby Waddell agreed, adding that they had made a strong push to improve reading and writing scores over the past five years.

Grasty also laid out the challenges county schools could face if hit hard by state budgets cuts in the 2010-11 fiscal year. A total of 59.1 percent of the school’s revenue comes from the state, she said.

Grasty said Gov. Timothy M. Kaine would release information about the upcoming budget on Dec. 18.

“We don’t know what the budget’s going to hold. Based on everything we’ve been hearing, predictions are fairly bleak.”

She also warned of a potential funding cliff that could be created by this year’s stimulus funds, which would not carry over into the 2010-2011 budget. A total of 17 teaching positions and seven other county school positions were retained through stimulus funds.