Use this search box to find articles that have run in our newspapers over the last several years.
Date: 4/28/2021
EAST LONGMEADOW – The East Longmeadow School Committee hosted its annual budget hearing during their meeting on April 26, directing their focus to insuring the success of students and meeting district goals.
According to the committee, the school year of 2021-2022 will focus on academics, social and emotional education and cultural responsiveness. Budget allocations will look to ensure that all students can access the full curriculum and receive the support they need to develop 21st Century skills and master social competencies during their academic experience.
Necessary modifications to department operations during the 2020-2021 school year will continue in 2021-2022, including:
•Purchasing PPE and cleaning supplies for all buildings
•Additional temporary staff - building permanent substitutes; lunch and recess monitors; substitute custodians; daily on-call substitutes
•Increasing contracted services in order to support students and staff
•Creating and outfitting outdoor spaces
•Continued use of panorama surveys
•Continued use of personalized learning software
The budget request for 2022 is a 2.78 percent increase from the 2021 budget, for a level services budget, with a total budget of $32,471, 200. It was stated that a portion of the funds distributed to schools are derived from organizations such as PTOs and financial contributions from families.
A $40,000 grant for teachers to help support needs in the classroom has been initiated, and teachers will receive applications to be submitted.
East Longmeadow Schools have also been approved another grant, SSR2, to help K-12 educational entities prepare and respond to impacts of COVID-19. The $965,608 grant, which extends to Sept. 30, 2023, will go toward permanent subtitute teachers, summer school and after school programs, custodial IT support, social and emotional support services, PPE supplies and tents for outdoor learning spaces. The School Committee approved these grant expendtiures, however,. minimum of $10,000 of the funds must be spent on social and emotional services.
Aside from school funding and grants, the School Committee shared that the district also plans to focus on their athletic department. Eighth graders who want to participate in varsity sports such as volleyball or softball will be able to do so.Currently, 22 students have signed up for softball.
The committee is also looking toward the reintroduction of athletic commpetitions and tournaments. At present, the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA) allows level two and three wrestling activities outdoors if possible, but indoor wrestling can only include socially distanced activities. Information regarding the next steps in the MIAA modifications and approval process will be disseminated to membership as it is readily available.
For now the wrestling program is doing fitness and social distance drills – there will be no contact drills until more clarification from MIAA. The first day of spring sports was April 26, teams will be following the Level 1 modification until further notice.
The following are the various level phases the district is taking into consideration when figuring out their plan for sports teams:
•Level 1: Individual or socially distanced group activities (non-contact workouts, aerobic conditioning, individual skill work, and drills)
•Level 2: Competitive Practices (Intra-team/group games, contact drills, and scrimmages)
•Level 3: Competitions (Inter-team games, meets, matches, races, etc)
•Level 4: Tournaments
The spring sport season’s first competitions begin three to four weeks after the first day of spring sports. The committee shared that the East Longmeadow Schools hope to reach level three in order for athletes to begin competing.