School board hears about early childhood program

Last week the Hot Springs County School District #1 Board of Trustees heard from Amy Ready, director of the Early Childhood program with the district, on some upcoming changes on both the state and local level.

According to Ready, the state’s legislators requested a study be done on all the early childhood programs across the state and the results from the first phase of the study has prompted the legislature to move funding from the Department of Health to the Department of Education.

Ready believes this will be a good thing, but we will not know for certain until the legislative session in January.

The good news is our program is ranked at the top of the study.

One of the reasons for this is our local program is changed around every year. Ready is a resource for the pre-schools and home based childcare facilities as well as pre-K healthcare.

“We have added programs like mommy’s pre-school and we have kinderboost this year,” Ready said. “We do a lot of screening. I figure we’ve screened just about every kid in town by this time.”

Ready travels to the Children’s Resource Center, HeadStart and others to help them with their programs as well.

One thing Ready has seen is a lack of pre-school opportunities for children with the closing of some facilities. Risen Son Christian School has a pre-school, but there is a waiting list, which prompted Ready to start a pre-school drop off program into her curriculum, something she is hoping to continue with the blessing of the school board.

“We have been talking about a pre-school for years,” she said. “If we had one class three times a week in the mornings and another in the afternoon I could still do the mom’s and tots program.”

The only caveat would be the need for a paraprofessional, which would have to be paid for by the district.

Opening a pre-school wouldn’t interfere with CRC’s program and it would open up more spaces for three-year olds in the HeadStart program. The only one that may be affected would be Risen Son.

“We are really trying to fill the gap, especially since the loss of Kiddie Kollege,” Ready said. “The parents have been asking for this.”

The board gave Ready the go-ahead to move forward with a solid plan that she can bring back to them for approval.

When it comes to going to college and the Hathaway Scholarship opportunities for Wyoming students, the ACT test is the benchmark for academic success.

English instructors Todd Helms and Alex McLean presented information to the board on what is being done at the high school to get the students most prepared for taking the ACT test their junior year.

The pair said they have been focusing heavily on getting the students ready for the ACT, working a couple of days a week just on ACT prep.

“The kids are being really good about seeking out help in the things they aren’t strong in,” Helms said. “We can pin-point their problems a lot earlier this way.”

There is a new computer based program the students are using for their prep and it appears to be working great.

“The honors course kids are especially benefitting from it,” Helms said. “We’re now looking to ramp up the rigor on the material we’re covering to equate with the new program and up those ACT scores.”

Another thing the instructors are using is demographic information – comparing us to other schools – making the kids work harder to “beat” their competitors. The age-old rivalry between Thermopolis and Worland is one demographic being used.

Already there is talk about moving this program down to the sophomore class as well to get them interested early. They want to make great ACT scores part of the Bobcat culture.

“The earlier you can catch this, the more time you have to correct any shortcomings,” said Helms.

The thought of the ACT is already being introduced at the middle school level. The way problems are worded in the MAP testing is similar to that used in the ACT, giving kids the opportunity to get used to seeing questions in that kind of format.

Board trustee Travis Bomengen said he would like to hear from other departments – math, science – to see what they’re doing. He said English seems to be doing fine, but some of the others appear to be behind.