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Maximum bonus OK’d in D-155 Board awards superintendent $14K – top amount allowed in contract On the Web
By EMILY K. COLEMAN ecoleman@shawmedia.com
Johnnie Thomas
CRYSTAL LAKE – Community High School District 155’s superintendent will receive the maximum bonus allowed under his contract, the school board decided this week. The bonus was approved in a 6-1 vote Tuesday evening after
To read Superintendent Johnnie Thomas’ employment contract, visit NWHerald.com.
the board met in closed session to discuss Superintendent Johnnie Thomas’s performance over
the past school year and whether he met his goals. “He’s helped increase the rigor,” board President Ted Wagner said. “It’s something we’ve been working at. Our high schools are nationally recognized. We’ve gone from a thousand students in our [Advanced Placement] classes to 2,800.” The goals laid out for Thom-
as as part of the contract focus on increasing participation in the district’s Advanced Placement program, investigating ways to improve academic performance on state tests and on internal grading measurements, developing programs to improve the social and emotional well-being of students, creating plans that maintain balanced budgets
See D-155, page A2
Night church changed forever
ENROLLMENT STABILIZING? After decline, some county school districts could see student numbers leveling off
The ASSOCIATED PRESS CHARLESTON, S.C. – When Angela Brown saw the Facebook post about a shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, her mind immediately leapt to her aunt. Whenever the doors to Emanuel were open to its flock, Ethel Lance was there. “This was her home,” said her niece, standing in the shadow of its soaring spire, tears streaming down her face. So many people felt that way about “Mother” Emanuel. Founded in 1818 by a free black shoemaker, the church stood as a beacon in a port city through which many legions of Africans passed on their way to bondage. Torched by angry whites after one organizer led a failed slave revolt, Emanuel rose from the ashes to serve as a stop on the Underground Railroad, even as state leaders banned all black churches and forced the congregation itself underground. The current brick Gothic revival edifice was a mandatory stop for the likes of Booker T. Washington and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Still, Emanuel was not just a church for the black community. And so, when a young white man walked into the Bible study Wednesday evening and asked for the minister, no one thought twice. The Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Emanuel’s senior pastor, invited the stranger to sit beside him. “He wanted him to feel at home, comfortable,” said Sylvia Johnson, the minister’s cousin. “Nothing to be fearful of. This is the house of the Lord, and you are welcome.” But the visitor had not come to worship or to commune.
By EMILY K. COLEMAN ecoleman@shawmedia.com CRYSTAL LAKE – Crystal Lake Community School District 47 saw a slight bump in its enrollment this year – a sign that after years of decline, enrollment may be stabilizing for some McHenry County school districts. Declining enrollment has forced many school districts to tighten their belts, reorganize their staff and adjust to fewer dollars from the state, some for more than a decade and others since the housing market tanked. But that trend may finally be changing for some area school districts. Cary School District 26 saw its population drop by 2.33 percent this past school year, a lower rate of decline than the 4.12 percent it saw moving into the 2013-14 school year and the 6.67 percent it had heading into the 2012-13 school year, according to data collected by the Illinois State Board of Education. District 47 saw its enrollment inch upwards by 100 students, or 1.34 percent, this past school year after falling by 463 students, or 5.84 percent, the year before, the data showed. That – and the interest potential subdivision developers have been showing in some in-fill lots – has the superintendents of Community High School District 155 and its feeder districts looking into updating the enrollment projections they had commissioned five years ago, District 47 Superintendent Kathy Hinz said. The report currently expects enrollment to stabilize for District 26 in about two years, Superintendent Brian Coleman said. Hinz gets weekly enrollment reports sent to her, and she’s watching her kindergarten registration carefully, wondering if that incoming cohort will make this year’s bump a trend. “We watch it and measure it so frequently,” she said. “The one thing we would love our families to help us with is that it’s great when they register earlier rather than
and fiscal soundness and developing strategies to improve internal and external communication. The district is in its first year of Thomas’s four-year contract, which lays out the maximum bonus he can receive each year. This year the bonus was
View the numbers For a graphic detailing the yearly enrollment numbers for McHenry County school districts, visit NWHerald.com.
later. We do our staff training in August, but we may get 40 kids in the last days of August. It’s easier to make sure we can have smaller class sizes if we know our enrollment.” It’s not just the school districts that have been in decline that are seeing their enrollment trends moderate. Huntley-based Consolidated School District 158 saw its enrollment skyrocket 13.44 percent a decade ago compared to just 0.59 percent this past school year and 1.70 percent the year before that, according to Illinois State Board of Education data. With room in its elementary schools and Huntley High School
See ENROLLMENT, page A7 Photo provided
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Multiple agencies respond to fatal crash on Route 176 bridge over the Fox River / A3 BUSINESS
Chatting about fatherhood Professional ranter Adam Carolla speaks volumes in the title of his latest book, ‘Daddy, Stop Talking!’ / Style, 6-7
Young entrepreneur Marian Central student in Woodstock launches GamerCrates subscription service / D1
See CHARLESTON, page A4
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