Demopolis BOE hires Clark for truancy post

Though he is retiring, Leon Clark’s service to Demopolis City Schools has not yet reached its culmination. The former U.S. Jones Elementary School principal will spend 12 hours each week next academic year helping the system with student truancy.

“When students miss multiple unexcused days throughout the school year – 10 or more – that’s not acceptable. Our average daily attendance rate goal is 95 percent throughout the whole year. We finished this year just over 92 percent. When you look at those numbers, 10 percent of our whole student body are the ones missing all these days,” Demopolis City Schools Superintendent Kyle Kallhoff said. “We want to proactively support and help our families get these kids to school. “

The Demopolis City Schools Board of Education approved Clark for the truancy assistance position during its meeting Monday afternoon. The need for the help arises out of the school system’s desire to better meet student needs where attendance is concerned.

“So, before we have to do our last straw and refer them to the juvenile system of Marengo County, we are going to bring on Mr. Clark with limited hours per week to help with that process,” Kallhoff explained. “We’re going to try to hold attendance court quarterly. It could be monthly after we get started. He’ll help with that. We’ll work with the police department, DHR, public health, whoever we can have at the table to see how we can help these families that are starting to accumulate these absences. If that doesn’t work, then we’ll refer them to the juvenile system in Marengo County.”

Even factoring in the widespread absences related to the abnormally high number of flu cases during the 2017-2018 school year, Demopolis saw unacceptable trends in absenteeism.

“This year was an exception, no doubt about it. When I look at that 92 percent, I know that this is an exceptional year because of the epidemic with what January and most of February was like. When we look at individual students, we find patterns like every Thursday and every Friday,” Kallhoff said. “We look at patterns in attendance and it’s more than illnesses and epidemics. It’s the fact that kids aren’t coming to school because it’s not a priority in that household. That bothers us as educators and we want to do some things to support those parents to help make it a priority.”

The court will not be a final ruling on the student, but will be designed to facilitate student attendance through the providing of resources aimed at meeting familial needs. Clark’s role, according to Kallhoff, figures to be a natural fit given the long-time principal’s personal and professional strengths.

“His organization. We want to make sure we get the proper letters sent home at the proper time. If we give him a list of 10 kids we want to meet with, he’s going to contact those kids and their families and I feel pretty sure they’ll be at the meeting,” Kallhoff said. “He knows our kids and he knows our families too. It’ll be a familiar face for them.”

In other actions, the board transferred Kristina Kallhoff from a teacher position at U.S. Jones Elementary to a similar position at Westside Elementary School. The board also approved a contract with Bereshith Davis for music classes at Westside Elementary School. The personnel action sheet approved by the board Monday includes:

• Cynthia Lambert as English Teacher at Demopolis High School
• Sydney Reeves Leonard as Special Education Teacher at Demopolis Middle School
• Carrie Williams as Science Teacher at Demopolis Middle School
• Germaine Dansby as Elementary Teacher at U.S. Jones Elementary
• Khadijah Abston as Elementary Teacher at Westide Elementary
• Potricia Clark as Elementary Teacher at Westside Elementary
• Alyssa Wrensted Stewart as Elementary Teacher at Westside Elementary
• Marjuyua Walker Jackson as Special Education Teacher as U.S. Jones Elementary
• Robin Lee as 10-month ARI Reading Coach at Westside Elementary
• Lataya Fluker as Pre-K Auxiliary Teacher at Westside Elementary
• Lakeshia Johnson as Pre-K Auxiliary Teacher at Westside Elementary
• Crystal Harvey-Murphy as Special Education Aide at Westside Elementary
• Jennifer McCray as Instructional Aide at U.S. Jones Elementary
• Jessica Raulston as Instructional Aide at U.S. Jones Elementary

The Demopolis City Schools Superintendent is hopeful that the final five positions posted by the system can be filled by the July 16 board meeting. Open positions include a self-contained classroom Special Education teacher position at Westside, a fourth grade teacher at U.S. Jones, a cafeteria worker at DMS, an English teacher at DHS and a history teacher at DHS.

“We are watching our first grade numbers closely and our kindergarten numbers closely. First grade, if everyone shows up that we have on paper, it is extremely high. We’re monitoring that,” Kallhoff said. “We could be in a position where I ask the board to allow us to bring another elementary teacher on, at least one and maybe two. You want kindergarten and first grade kids. You don’t want to slow that down. At the same time, you don’t want 20 kids in a classroom in kindergarten and first grade.”