School begins Sept. 8 - Many changes this year

          It’s time for another school year to begin, and while the construction project is coming to an end, our staff is getting excited about the new facilities and the educational benefits these renovations will bring to our students. As always, we are saying goodbye to some longtime dedicated employees, who have decided to begin their own new adventures in retirement.

         Head Bus Driver…Gordon Eggleston; Bus Drivers…Guy Barton, Roger McDuffee and Kermit Mosher combine for 99 years of service in our transportation department. We will miss their smiling faces and morning greetings each day. We thank them and wish them a long happy retirement.

           Likewise last Spring and during this Summer, we have experienced changes in our teaching staff with the decisions by Mr. Phillips with 35 years, Mrs. Phillips with 21 years, Miss Maiello with 33 years and Mr. Kahn with 34 years of dedication, commitment, professionalism and expertise in coaching and teaching the children of this community. They have touched so many lives in untold ways over the course of their contributions to the total education of the students. However, we are delighted to report their decisions to retire include their willingness to continue to coach, teach and be a part of our educational community.

          Beginning with this school year and in the future, our district will operate with fewer bus routes, less bus stops, less counseling services and fewer instructional staff, as our Board of Education attempts to continue our high quality of education for our students at a cost which is affordable to the entire community. In addition to the instructional benefits, our district has replaced an unsafe structurally unsound bus garage with a new energy efficient prefabricated metal building which will house both maintenance vehicles and equipment along with all school buses undercover twelve months a year, which will enable our district to ensure longer life of operation to the vehicles and provide for ease of maintenance and cleaning for safety of our students.

         With a new Library-Media Center in the elementary school; a new playground area for present and future children of the community to enjoy, renovated classrooms with energy efficient windows; solar panels on our roofs (which teachers will be able to utilize and students will learn from this new alternative energy source); more physical therapy and life long fitness facilities for our students; the teachers’ task will be made easier at a cost of “pennies on the dollar” to the community.

           As noted earlier, our construction will continue into the Fall and early Winter months. In the coming weeks, we look forward to the addition of two complete walls of tack board for displays of student work and instructional bulletin boards in each of our renovated elementary classrooms, more classrooms with interactive white board technology and computers, new life skills classrooms, and expanded fitness areas and equipment, (which can be opened up to our community during non-school hours).

        Our entire instructional community wishes to thank the members of the 2007-2008 Fort Plain Central School District, Board of Education (President David Fredericks, James Petty Jr., Mary Beth Hudyncia, Russell Vance, Robyn Cutspec, Amy Sammons, and Jami Stevens for their foresight, commitment, financial planning and willingness to provide a plan for an affordable solution to continue to update our facilities with increased energy savings and state of the art equipment and instructional materials for the children of this community.
 

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