PREPARING NEW SPECIALTIES Superintendent advocates themed schools by David Zaslawsky
Of course, these are dreams. The harsh reality is money. There may be some $11.4 million in stimulus funds available, but the district won’t know until summer, Thompson said. She estimates the cost of a new eastside high school and K-12 school in the southern tier between $50 million and $60 million. The school district would need financial help from the city and county, Thompson said. The IB program “brings in an academic rigor to a level that we do not have in Montgomery,” Thompson said. “The students are earning college credits. It’s considered an accelerated, very advanced academic program.” She would like to see the IB program function similar to a Career Academy and allow students from throughout the district to apply.
Montgomery Public Schools Superintendent Barbara Thompson.
Montgomery Public Schools Superintendent Barbara Thompson is an advocate of themed schools. “I really like themes; it helps to focus you in terms of your curriculum,” Thompson said. “It helps in your hiring process. It helps when you have a theme because then people that you are hiring understand where you are going.” Thompson would like to add two schools that both would feature themes. She would like to see a new high school built in East Montgomery that would have an international baccalaureate (IB) theme. Another goal is to combine DunbarRamer and Pintlala schools in the district’s southern tier into a K-12 school with a science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) theme. If the district would add a third school, Thompson would like to see a foreign language theme.
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Montgomery Business Journal May 2010
“For the IB, there’s an extensive training process that the teachers go through,” Thompson said. “The teachers are trained specifically on this curriculum so it’s very academically rigorous.” There has been talk about an eastside high school and several possible locations. Thompson said that former Montgomery Public Schools Superintendent John Dilworth was looking at a site off Ray Thorington Road. “You are talking about 35 to 40 acres in an area with water and sewer and you have to have at least two access points for a high school,” Thompson said. A STEM theme at a new southern tier school “gives you a different focus for the kinds of teachers you’re going to be hiring,” Thompson said. “You are going to be looking for people who have very, very strong science, technology, engineering and math backgrounds.” Thompson estimated that a new southern tier K-12 school would have about 1,400 students. But that’s only the beginning. She said she hopes to attract students at private schools in the surrounding area.