Prairie Grove School Officials Give Annual Report

PRAIRIE GROVE -- Allen Williams, superintendent of schools, gave the Annual Report to the Public at the School Board's October meeting.

Schools across the state are required to give an annual report. Williams gave a district-wide report and school principals gave annual reports for their respective school buildings in separate meetings.

For the 2016-17 school year, Prairie Grove schools started the year with a balance of $2.2 million and ended the year with a balance of $2 million. Total revenue was about $16 million and total expenditures were $16.3 million.

The district's building fund started the year with $2.6 million for 2016-17. Revenues for the year were $1.1 million and expenditures totaled $1.2 million. This included purchasing 61 acres across from the high school and purchasing the Arvest Bank building on Buchanan Street.

As of Oct. 1, the district had a total of 1,920 students enrolled in school, compared to 1,909 on Oct. 1, 2016. The high school has 611 students; the middle school has 609 students and the elementary school has 700 students enrolled in class. These numbers change also daily as students leave the district and new ones come into the district.

David Kellogg, district assistant superintendent, gave the facilities' annual report and it shows projects proposed for the next few years include a replacing the roof on the middle school, demolishing the old administration building and building a new school for middle school students.

For safety and security, the district has a school resource officer and all employees and students are trained in the program called ALICE, Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter and Evacuate. All employees have a flip chart with emergency numbers and this chart is available beside by every phone in the district.

For transportation, the district is continuing to purchase one bus annually and to improve its ability to improve business maintenance. For the last few years, a new bus has cost about $112,000, Kellogg said.

For technology, the district plans to install a new firewall to support more users and more internet bandwidth. Another goal is to install wireless access points in every classroom, kindergarten through 12th grade.

Under instruction and federal programs, Leslie Sharp, assistant superintendent, said administrators will continue strategic planning sessions with the School Board.

The district is emphasizing a "good start" for students in kindergarten-third grade, Sharp said. Studies show that students who have a good start and are on grade level by third grade will do better the rest of their school career, Sharp said.

The middle school and high school are promoting all students participating in pre-Advanced Placement classes and AP classes.

Sharp said Prairie Grove teachers have "bought into the goal" that any students who want to take an AP class, they should be given the opportunity.

The high school also plans to improve student opportunities through career tech programs including work/internships and recognized certifications.

For test scores, results show that district scores revealed growth in English, math and writing from 2016 to 2017.

For English, 77 percent of students met or exceeded college readiness for English on the ACT Aspire tests given in spring 2017. For math, 59 percent met or exceeded college readiness; for writing, 47 percent met or exceeded college readiness on the ACT Aspire test.

When compared to other small schools in northwest Arkansas, Prairie Grove was either number one or number two for all areas on the ACT Aspire, compared to Farmington, Lincoln, Elkins, West Fork, Greenland and Huntsville.

For the ACT test, students scored above the state average on the 2017 test. Prairie Grove's composite score was 20.5, compared to a state average of 18.8.

In 2017, 235 high school students took at least one AP test and the school gave 401 AP exams. Of these tests, 160 exam results, or 28.6 percent, were passing grades, a 3, 4 or 5. In addition, 94 students or 40 percent, passed at least one of their AP exams. This compares to 36.5 percent of the number of students who passed AP tests statewide.