The Centralia High School Board received feedback on its LISS program during public comment at its regular board meeting on Thursday. Community member Jeff Dahlquist gave a presentation on in-school suspension programs and claimed that CHS has a punitive model of ISS that isolates students and hurts learning outcomes. Dahlquist argued the school needs to place a greater focus on rehabilitating problem students and giving them the means to participate in their education.
Superintendent Chuck Lane says CHS will continue looking at ways to improve the program.
“It’s a new program, and there’s always room for improvement,” Lane said. “We’re going to take what he said and try to make the program better… it was designed to reduce suspensions, which it has so far, but it’s going to take a while to get some of the kinks worked out. We’ve only been doing it for a semester. At the end of the year, we’ll evaluate and see if there are any changes that we need to make.”
Lane reports that both the school’s ongoing solar panel and pole barn projects are nearing completion. Lane says the solar panels are fully installed, and all that remains to be done is electrical work by Ameren. Both projects are expected to be finished this Spring.
The board gave approval to purchase a wrestling mat printed with the name of retired wrestling coach Dick Carpenter to honor his 42 years as a coach at CHS.
Centralia High School’s graduation date has been set for Sunday, May 18 at 2 PM.
The American Red Cross will be holding a blood drive at CHS on March 6 from 8:30 AM to 1:15 PM.
The board accepted the resignation of board member Galen Mahle, who was required to vacate his seat on the school board to avoid a conflict of interest with his role as Centralia’s new city manager. Mahle was in attendance to read his resignation letter and wished the school the best for the future.
In personnel, the board approved the employment of Latavia Maines as girls’ assistant track coach, Jordyn Looman as girls’ assistant track coach, James Wright as math teacher for the next school year, and Carla Freeman as part-time cafeteria worker.
