Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
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Monday, August 11, 2008
DPS attendance very low at some high schools
(Junior Latoya Allen, left, and freshman Katherine Gaile, right, wait for the RTA bus to pick them up after school in front of Stivers School of the Arts.)
There weren’t too many problems getting kids to school Monday, even without district-paid bus service.
But the question is how many kids stayed home?
Initial attendance figures for city high schools ranged from good to bleak. Based on the number of students on the books as enrolled compared to those who actually came to school, attendance was solid at Stivers School for the Arts (93 percent) and Patterson Career Center (87 percent) but well off the pace at Meadowdale (67 percent) and Belmont (67 percent).
School officials cautioned that first day enrollment is often a hazy figure, as the district has not accounted yet for all transfers and other changes from the prior year. The district did not have last year’s first day attendance for comparison.
Mark Donaghy, executive director of the Dayton Regional Transit Authority, said RTA officials suspected low attendance contributed to fewer than expected problems.
“It matches the attendance at the schools,” he said.
Interim Superintendent Kurt Stanic said he has asked his staff to compare attendance with last year’s first day of school. School officials need to study why attendance was high at some schools and low at others, he said.
“It’s not unusual for urban school populations to gradually increase right up until Labor Day,” he said. “But no matter what it was last year, I’d like it to be higher.”
Stivers School for the Arts senior Megan Hegner said she walked to her friend Brittny McNabb’s Old North Dayton house for a ride to school. At dismissal, the two waited for the No. 2 bus on Fifth Street for a ride downtown where they could get a bus home.
“I have to scrounge money for the bus,” Hegner said.
The two said they may start walking home from Stivers, but are worried about getting to school as they year goes on.
“We’ll be out there freezing in the winter,” McNabb said.
First Day of School Attendance
School district high school attendance Monday was:
Meadowdale 67 percent
Belmont 67 percent
Thurgood Marshall 81 percent
Dunbar 81 percent
Patterson 87 percent
Stivers 93 percent
(Image credit: Teesha McClam, DDN)
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School begins smoothly in Dayton
(Students wait to board an RTA bus outside Stivers School for the Arts Monday.)
As city high schools opened for the school year Monday without bus service, most kids appeared to make it to class on time and with relatively few problems.
At Belmont and Dunbar high schools, officials and students reported more cars dropping off students than normal along with crowded city buses but overall few had major concerns.
Deputy Superintendent Lori Ward, who oversees transportation in the district, said she had no significant bad reports following the start of classes. School officials will continue to monitor traffic at the schools and attendance during the week as students settle into new routines.
“There appears to be a lot more automobiles, but will that keep up or is it a sign of the time?” she said. “A lot of kids like to have a ride to school on the first day. We need to watch the week in full to get a better picture.”
Interim Superintendent Kurt Stanic said he visited at the bus garage at 5 a.m. and was pleased with how the day was going by mid-morning.
“People have been cooperative,” he said. “There are still concerns. It’s early. I want to see attendance at the end of the day.”
Busing was first eliminated last summer to save money after a levy defeat in May of 2007 but the city, county and Greater Dayton Regional Transit Authority helped raise funds to restore the service in time for the start of school.
This summer, those partners said they could not offer funds and the district again dropped high school bus service, which is not required by state law. The RTA estimated up to 4,000 students could have to pay their own way to school on city buses, many of them on regular routes as fewer “limited service” buses going directly to schools are on the road this year.
The district continues to struggle with deep budget cuts and the school board has promised a new levy try in November. Bus service is not expected to be restored this year.
Students said RTA bus routes were crowded. Dunbar senior Edward Brown rode a city bus from his Five Oaks neighborhood downtown, where he switched to a limited service route that connects to Dunbar.
“It made everything harder,” he said. “There were people standing and sitting on the steps.”
Tobeshia Jones, a freshman at Belmont, said driver on her bus from North Main Street to downtown did a good job controlling the large crowd of students mixed in with the regular adult passengers.
“It was a little rowdy,” she said. “It was really full. But the bus driver could control them.”
(Image credit: Teesha McClam, DDN)
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