By Rose Laudicina
Staff Writer
After 11 weeks filled with family vacations, summer camps and sleeping in, summer break comes to an abrupt end Aug. 27, when students in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools district return to class.
Although students have had time off, the district has been busy preparing for the 2012-13 school year since graduation. From renovating schools to updating curriculum and websites, Todd LoFrese, assistant superintendent for support services, said while students are gone the district is busy making improvements to infrastructure.
“Summertime is always a busy time for us. We have a lot of different areas of the district that do some major projects over the summer,†LoFrese said.
Some of the major projects were construction-based, including roofing work at McDougle, Phillips and Glenwood; athletic facility construction at Carrboro High; and bathroom renovations at Frank Porter Graham, LoFrese said.
Frank Porter Graham Principal Rita Bongarten said she is grateful for the renovations and general sprucing up of the campus grounds that occurred over the summer.
While many of the school improvements were repairs, some were done to increase capacity at district schools.
A major concern for the upcoming school year, according to LoFrese, is overcrowding at the elementary-school level.
To help alleviate overcrowding, mobile units for pre-K classes were added at Estes Hills while the basement at Glenwood was completely renovated, allowing for more usable space.
However, despite these additions LoFrese said overcrowding will occur and additional actions will be taken as the school year progresses.
“We are kind of running out of options, and schools like Seawell and Glenwood are extremely overcrowded,†he said. “While elementary 11 will be opened next year, we really needed the school this year to address overcrowding.â€
LoFrese added that construction on elementary 11, located in the Northside neighborhood, was moving ahead on schedule.
In addition to construction, the district has also been making major staffing changes, which have kept the human resources department busy, LoFrese said.
“We had well over 150 vacancies in teaching and staff positions,†he said. “The [human resources] department has been working diligently to get the positions filled and [they] have done an outstanding job meeting staffing needs by the start of the year.â€
Some of these vacancies were filled internally, such as the Carrboro High principal position, which was filled by LaVerne Mattocks, former Phoenix Academy principal.
However, there are still a few positions to be filled, including an assistant principal position at CHS, which is the school’s only remaining vacancy.
Mattocks said she is confident the position will be filled promptly, and in the meantime is increasingly excited about her first day.
“I feel very good about things. We have been working as a team to tighten things up and I think the school is ready for the start of the school year,†Mattocks said.
While she feels her staff is prepared, Mattocks acknowledges it will be a transformative year as the district begins to switch over to the Common Core curriculum, a standardized curriculum that the school board approved for the district last year.
“The good thing about this year is everybody is going to be learning and growing and doing something new together,†she said regarding the Common Core.
Bongarten also believes the transition to Common Core will be a big challenge and focus for the 2012-13 year.
The new curriculum isn’t the only major transition Bongarten and her staff will face this year at FPG. While the school celebrates its 50th anniversary, 2012-13 is the last year FPG will function as a traditional school. For the 2013-14 school year, it will become a Spanish dual-language magnet school for the district.
“We are celebrating all the good work we have been doing while knowing that we will be transitioning,†Bongarten said. “It will be a challenging year for sure … but as we always say, put your best paw forward and think about the positive that comes with the changes.â€