By KENDALL OWENS
T-H Staff Writer
Personnel in the Palestine-Wheatley School District were rehired from a blanket list presented to board members during the district's regular monthly meeting Monday.
The move followed an executive session during which the certified and classified employees were discussed. The list of employees was provided to the board by Superintendent Jimmy Allen.
The district's 2002/2003 calendar was also adopted during the meeting.
The board was also updated on the grade inflation index. According to Allen, this index shows up when scores on standardized tests, such as the ACT, show a student needs remedial classes upon entering college, although the student's high school scores show differently.
"The state has started holding school districts accountable for students having to take remedial courses on the college level. There have been times when we have had students make good grades on our level, but their entrance scores show them to be lacking in certain areas. What we're trying to do is implement programs that will help further prepare our outgoing seniors for college," said Allen.
The district is currently attempting to start a college preparatory class, but Allen said unless the district finds a state-approved reading instructor, the class will have to be put off. Allen also said that the district is going to hold a summer remediation class to help students throughout the district.
In other business, PWSD attorney Bill Snowden disputed a report in Friday's Times-Herald claiming the board violated the Freedom of Information Act by allowing police officers inside a teacher dismissal hearing and by not providing a place for the media and public to gather during the closed hearing.
Students involved in an alleged strip search earlier this year testified during the hearing before the board voted to fire high school principal Jeff Cagle.
Snowden said he talked with Bob Fisher with the Attorney General's office Monday and that Fisher told him there were no violations. Snowden said he explained to Fisher that the media was locked outside in order to protect the privacy of juveniles testifying during the hearing. He also said he told Fisher the police officers were in the hearing to prevent a disturbance.
However, several of the juveniles testifying in the hearing entered and exited the building through the main entrance where the media was gathered. The building which houses the Palestine-Wheatley Junior High School is over a block long and houses numerous classrooms and a gymnasium.
In another conversation today with the Times-Herald, Fisher said that under the Teacher Fair Dismissal Act, teachers may ask that a meeting be closed and may also request that other people be inside the meeting. "If their presence was justified, I guess the cops could be in there," Fisher said this morning.
"I thought there could have been better arrangements made," he said regarding locking the media and public outdoors during the hearing," Fisher said. "What I asked him was, wasn't there another room in the building where the press and public could have been lodged. He told me no, that it was a unique situation."
"In my view, when you have the rights of the public conflicting with the rights of juveniles, I think in that instance, I would come down on the side of the juveniles. The juveniles' names and reputations should be protected," Fisher said. "I still can't quite figure out why there was not another spot where they (media) could have waited."
"That's unusual the way they handled it, but not illegal," Fisher added.
By KENDALL OWENS
T-H Staff Writer
Questions surrounding a contract between the Forrest City Civic Center and the Civic Center commission may be transferred to the city council.
During a special meeting Monday afternoon, commissioners agreed to submit a letter to Mayor Larry Bryant asking that the council address the issues regarding the contract.
Commissioners, earlier this month, questioned a certified letter which had been mailed to Hitchcock last month. The letter requested an inventory of items in the civic center kitchen which belonged to Hitchcock as well as quarterly reports on civic center catering business.
Hitchcock told commission members that he had changed his address, claiming that is why he had not received the letter. He responded yesterday with an abbreviated inventory and with quarterly reports for both the final quarter of 2001 and the first quarter of 2002. Hitchcock provided commissioners with a list of events that he had catered during each month of the quarter and also with a total earned during the quarter.
The commission elected to accept Hitchcock's quarterly report, but failed to vote to accept the inventory. Discrepancies in the inventory, which labeled items owned by the city but did not identify items owned by Hitchcock, led to the commission's decision to draft a letter to Bryant regarding their concerns.
A Forrest City man was arrested on drug charges earlier today after police executed a search warrant at his apartment located in a public housing facility.
The Forrest City Police Department arrested Bishop Pruitt III, 26, at his home at 845 Rice St., Apt. 184, on charges of possession of a controlled substance (crack cocaine) with intent to deliver near certain facilities, possession of a firearm by certain persons and criminal use of a prohibited weapon.
During the search, police reportedly seized several rocks of crack cocaine, marijuana seeds and a sawed-off shotgun.
Sherrie Palmer, 25, 845 Rice St., Apt. 184, Forrest City, was also arrested during the raid. She is charged with theft of property under $500.
Pruitt is being held in the St. Francis County Jail, and is scheduled to be arraigned in St. Francis County District Court on Wednesday.