Ninety-four percent of West Liberty High School students passed all their classes for the first trimester.
That’s up from 87 percent in the first trimester of the 2023-24 school year.
“That’s a pretty high bar set for this year,” said high school principal Brenda Arthur-Miller. “Hopefully, we can keep going up.”
Arthur-Miller and assistant principal Andrew Genz presented the start of the year On-Track data at the Dec. 2 school board meeting. Arthur-Miller said that students who do the announcements on Tuesday morning keep the student body apprised of academic and attendance achievements. “I think it’s something that gets talked about,” among the students, she said. She also noted that many teachers also share the data in their classrooms.
“The more we’re talking about it, the more the kids are doing about it, and the more improvement we see.”
The student body of 388 students currently has an average GPA of 3.28, with the senior class, made up of 85 students, posting an average GPA of 3.55. The freshman class of 102 students has an average GPA of 2.97.
“I think sometimes, too, part of that presentation to students is what the GPA looks like based on kids with unexcused absences and unexcused tardies, and the significant difference you see between students who are on time to class or don’t have unexcused absences. And, how typically, their GPA is higher than students who do have unexcused absences and unexcused tardies,” she said.
She also said the grades have competitions to see who has the most students in attendance. The sophomore class won six out of the 14 weeks in the first trimester. Arthur-Miller said that was unusual, noting it was usually the freshman class that won. “Typically, the freshman class comes in from the middle school with just a great attitude about school and coming to school and being on time and all of that. They slipped a little bit, this year’s freshman class.” Arthur-Miller said she did not want to generalize the entire class, but noted there seemed to be a larger number of freshmen she described as apathetic about school.
Teachers update grades weekly. Information is sent out to coaches when students are not passing their classes, which Arthur-Miller said helps keep an extra set of eyes on students.
Ninety-seven percent of students in grades 10-12 are on-track to graduate with 56 credits, with freshmen posting a 93 percent on-track rate. As a freshman, a student would need to pass four of their six classes in the first trimester to graduate.
Arthur-Miller commended the staff for caring about students, especially those who are showing academic difficulties. She described them as one of the best resources the district has for taking care of students.
School board conference
Board members reported on the Iowa Association of School Boards’ annual convention. Every member of the board was present at the conference. Edward Moreno said he was encouraged by the fact that they all attended.
Jacob Burroughs attended the conference for the first time this year, and said he had the opportunity to network with the board president of the Davenport Community School District. They discussed school resources officers. The Davenport School District has five SROs and had recently mitigated a weapon on campus incident. The SROs building relationships with students was credited with helping prevent a violent incident within the district.
Burroughs also said he spoke with a session facilitator on the district’s concerns about immigration and law enforcement within the West Liberty community. The facilitator was from Texas and provided Burroughs resources to get more information on the subject.
Kira Achen and Rebecca Vargas attended a session on artificial intelligence. Achen said it might be helpful to start a technology committee to help the district stay abreast of new developments. Vargas said the facilitator told the group schools would need to find a way to work within AI, because in a year or two, the technology will be able to generate its own ideas.
Achen said she also attended a workshop on cell phones in school and said the district may also want to form a policy on phones in class. Vargas also attended the session and said the facilitator explained their school had a cubby system, where students put their phones in a pouch at the front of the classroom at the beginning of class and get it back at the end. Students are allowed to have their phones in the hallway and at lunch. Vargas said the Tama school districts had sent her their policies to look at. Achen said she learned about the degree to which students are negatively impacted by interactions on social media, and that removing cell phones from classrooms also leads to more interaction between students. Vargas said she thought the Iowa legislature might be taking up the phone issue, and it would be good to have a policy in place before that happens. Moreno also attended and said, “AI is here, and it’s clear we’re way behind.” He said the Pleasant Valley Community School District is currently working on its own AI policy.
Audra Daufeldt attended sessions on resources the IASB has and learned about boards that seek student input. She also learned about districts that have onboarding programs for new board members.
Moreno attended a workshop on poverty, which he said was “really powerful.” He also attended a session by representatives from the Perry School District. The Perry district shared what they have learned and policies they have put in place since a school shooting that killed a sixth grader and high school principal Dan Marburger in January. Moreno said the district should reach out to Perry to learn more.
Moreno said he also attended a breakout session with other Latino board members and was proud to share more about the West Liberty School District, including the dual-language program. He said he and the other board members from the session planned to meet again.
Superintendent shoutouts
Superintendent Shaun Kruger commended several staff members for going above and beyond, including special education teacher Monty Beal, who arranges for special needs students to attend Camp Courageous in Monticello for a day.
The office staff at the ELC/Elementary building were also congratulated, along with high school nurse Tana Deahr, for stepping in while nurse Kayla Morrison was doing some professional training. The support staff at the high school also got a shoutout at the River Valley Conference principals meeting at the end of November.
Kruger also congratulated students involved in fall activities, including 12 students with the RVC Honor Band, all-district and all-state academic athletes, the dance team, the cast of the fall play and much more. “It’s great to see some many of students participating in such a wide range of extracurricular activities. Kudos to the kids, teachers, sponsors.”