EPSB meets BCE cheerleaders; hears about changes to school scores

The Evangeline Parish School Board was introduced to the Bayou Chicot Cheerleading team during its bi-monthly meeting last Wednesday.
The junior high cheer squad was in attendance at the meeting to announce that three of its cheerleaders had been selected as All-American Cheerleaders.
Those cheerleaders are Jesa Vidrine, Mayzee LaFleur and Ainsley Dutton.
The cheer team’s sponsors, Anne Soileau and Fallen Ortego, also announced that the All-American Cheerleaders earned the opportunity to perform at the yesterday’s LSU game and will also be performing in the Thanksgiving Day Parade at Disney World in Orlando, Florida.
During the meeting, board members also heard from Special Education Director Roxane West and and Title I Supervisor Penny McDaniel concerning changes to student and school scores.
West said, “Changes to raise the bar for accountability came about in 2013 when BESE decided that a score of basic was no longer sufficient enough for proficiency. They decided that if we wanted to keep up with the rest of the country we would need to move our proficiency to Mastery.”
That major change could affect a school’s score from last year, which has not been released yet.
However, McDaniel shared that the State will be giving school’s a “grace period” to get students to the Mastery level beginning with the 2017-2018 school year.
McDaniel then explained that during the grace period, “a school will have to score anywhere between a 90 and 150, whereas last year they had to score between 100 and 150 to be considered an A school.”
The score required by a school to earn an A however, will eventually be put back to between 100 and 150 by 2025.
The scores for a D and F will remain the same through this grace period.
The board then heard from Lance Enkey with First Student during its meeting.
Enkey shared that they had recently held a driver’s meeting that principals attended as well.
He said, “We received a ton of feedback from the driver’s and principals and it turned out to be a very productive meeting.”
Enkey also informed the board of the system First Student has put in place to ensure no students are left on the bus.
Enkey said, “Each bus is equipped with a button in the back of the bus that the driver must go press before they get off of the bus. This forces them to walk the bus and check for children.”
Before the close of the meeting, Enkey also shared that First Student is working on an app that parents will be able to use to locate the bus that their child is on.
They are still in the beginning stages of created the app, but Enkey said that he may have a prototype to show the board next month.