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Your Community Press newspaper serving Loveland, Miami Township, Symmes Township E-mail: loveland@communitypress.com Tiffany Barrett exhibits her work at The Art Institute of Cincinnati.
Volume 92 Number 4 © 2010 The Community Press ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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Red-letter days
It is often said at the beginning of a new baseball season that “hope springs eternal.” Now, for the fourth year in a row, every Reds win will provide additional hope for people affected by cancer thanks to the Patty Brisben Foundation. SEE LIFE, B1
Bean counters
See how first-, second- and third-graders at Children’s Meeting House Montessori School recently celebrated 100 days of school. SEE SCHOOLS, A6
The spice of life
Blue sky and sunshine finally broke the winter doldrums Saturday, March 6, and the St. Columban council of the Knights of Columbus celebrated with their fourth annual chili fest. SEE STORY, A2
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Kindergarten cost a concern
Board asks for waiver from state By Jeanne Houck
jhouck@communitypress.com
The Loveland Board of Education says it would cost the district more than $1 million to implement full-day kindergarten next school year and wants the state to waive a new rule requiring that. The Ohio legislature voted in July 2009 to require all school districts in the state to offer all-day, every-day kindergarten, beginning with the 2010-2011 school year. It subsequently agreed to allow school districts to seek a delay from the Ohio superintendent of public instruction until the following year if the requirement presents a hardship. The Loveland school board voted Feb. 24 to request the waiver. “The district is requesting the waiver due to the operating costs – approximately $1 million annually – plus the additional costs to provide the space, which we currently do not have,” said Meg Krsacok, communications coordinator for the Loveland City Schools. Krsacok said the district would have to add the equivalent of seven and a half kindergarten teachers, one special education intervention specialist, one educational aide and six counselors, resulting in new personnel costs of
Loveland Early Childhood Center teacher Karen Knueven helps kindergartners and first-graders off the bus for the first day of school. about $1 million. Also, “We would need at least eight additional classrooms, which could cost millions of dollars to construct or remodel,” Krsacok said. Krsacok said the district has
334 students in its morning and its afternoon kindergarten classes – eight sections in the morning and seven in the afternoon. The morning sessions run from 9 a.m. to 11:50 a.m. and the afternoon sessions run from 1
PROVIDED
p.m. to 3:50 p.m. “According to (the new law), a school district must not only provide full-day kindergarten, but must also offer parents the option of half-day kindergarten for their child,” Krsacok said.
Most Loveland candidates have Buckeye backgrounds Fifteen people, including seven current superintendents, have expressed interest in the Loveland City School District’s superintendent position. Thirteen of the 15 have backgrounds with Ohio districts. One is from Colorado and one is from Canada. Former Superintendent Kevin Boys left the district earlier this year to become president of Shawnee State Communtiy College. Former Lebanon City School Superintendent Bill Sears is filling the position on an interim basis. Sears has said he is not interested in the job permanently. Names and resumes were obtained from Effron and Associates, a search firm assisting the school district. This is the list as of Feb. 28: Kathleen Cintavey, superintendent, Wickliffe (Ohio)
City schools; Stacey Lyn Cooper, executive director, secondary education/principal, Mansfield (Ohio) City Schools; Matthew Dill, superintendent, Fort Frye (Ohio) Local Schools; Heather Henderson Hill, deputy superintendent, Chinook’s Edge (Alberta, Canada) School Division; Brian Hodges, director, Douglas County (Col.) School District; Larry Hook, assistant superintendent, Springboro City Schools. Hook worked in the Milford School District from 1990 to 2002; John Marschhausen, superintendent, East Knox (Ohio) Local Schools; Gail Jackson-Mitchell, former associate
superintendent, Dayton (Ohio) City Schools; Debra Kennedy, assistant superintendent, New Philadelphia (Ohio) Schools; Carl Metzger, superintendent, Marian (Ohio) Local Schools; Clinton A. Moore, superintendent, National Trail (Ohio) Local Schools; Kenneth Ratliff, assistant to the superintendent, Fairland (Ohio) Local Schools; Jerry Skiver, superintendent, New Boston (Ohio) Local Schools; Bruce Thomas, regional superintendent of schools, Cleveland Metropolitan Schools; William Welker, superintendent, Eastwood (Ohio) Local Schools.
Miami Twp. trying to spin interest in disc golf course By Mary Dannemiller mdannemiller@communitypress.com
Miami Township officials want your help building a disc golf course in Community Park. Disc golf is a popular sport similar to golf where players try to throw flying discs into a series of baskets spread throughout a course. The winner is the player who gets it in the baskets on the fewest number of attempts. The idea of building a disc golf course at the park was brought to
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the trustees by resident Cole Caldeway, who died suddenly shortly after approaching the trustees with the idea. Now the trustees and Caldeway’s family want to continue the project in his memory. “His mother and wife wanted to do something in his memory and said they’d love to donate to the development of a disc golf course since it was important to Cole,” Wolff said. To help get the disc golf course built, the township is looking for
anyone who might be interested in sponsoring one of the course’s baskets. “It’s a fairly inexpensive venture,” Wolff said. “You can be a sponsor for about $300 per basket.” Miami Township Recreation Director Krystin Thibodeau said other local disc golf courses are popular so having one available to township residents would help draw people to the park. “There are a lot of people who love that sport,” she said. “The other courses in different parts of
Cincinnati are highly used and it’s a lot of fun. It would be a free thing for people to do where they can go out and do something with a competitive nature and it would really add something to our park system.” Township Administrator Larry Fronk said he would like to begin the course’s construction this spring, but the project is still in the planning process. Anyone interested in sponsoring a basket should contact Fronk at 248-3725.
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