Creativity brings Innovation

Pontiac schools making some innovative plans

Thursday, February 19, 2009 6:09 AM EST

By The Oakland Press

In the past few weeks, the Pontiac School District has been taking some unpopular but needed action to survive. It is closing half of its schools and decided to combine Northern and Central into one high school.

Now it appears the district may not only be moving toward its survival but taking strides to significantly improve the quality of the education it offers to students.

In fact, shall we dare say that Pontiac could become an educational leader in the metro area?

That’s the message we’re getting from recent announcements of plans for the new, merged high school.

Pontiac’s new high school is scheduled to open in the fall on the city’s north side and will offer four magnet career academies.

Under the initial concept, the school will feature a revamped ninth-grade academy; a business, finance and entrepreneurship academy; an arts and communications academy and a scholars academy.

The BFE Academy will include the legal program already under way. All academies will give students the opportunity to earn certification in career areas. In addition, the building may be utilized the entire day, providing students the opportunity to do online makeup courses as late as 7 p.m.

The initial plans are impressive and certainly offer district residents hope for the future.

A first glimpse of the concept was given by Geralyn Stephens, with whom the Pontiac Board of Education contracted to create a high school geared to meet students’ curriculum needs and improve academics and career opportunities for youth.

The outline is intriguing.

Students, teachers and counselors would be divided into teams and stay with their teams for core and career classes. However, they also would take part in community programs, such as band, outside their team.

Teachers, counselors and social workers address the individual needs of the students on their team.

Each teacher will see where their students are and will work with the counselors and social workers to help meet their needs.

Under a restructuring plan, Central High School will be closed in the fall and Central and Northern students will be combined in a new type of school at the Northern building at Perry and Madison.

The four career academies were selected based on state required assessments given to ninth- through 11th-grade students that provided the top interest areas of students.

In addition, Stephens’ team did an audit of students’ transcripts to determine where they are in respect to completing high school graduation requirements. They found a need for many students to take some online courses to bring them up to where they should be.

Stephens stressed she only presented a framework, and said a team of staff, teachers, parents, special-education experts and students will be formed to work on details of the plan.

There appears to be quite a bit of work yet to be accomplished, but the plan is promising.

If it materializes as well as expected, it not only could help restore Pontiac’s diminished reputation as a school system but possibly catapult the district into a new, innovative leadership role.