New middle school will have STEM focus

MOSES LAKE - The committee working on a schedule for the new middle school recommended that elective classes focus on science and technology.

Columbia Basin Secondary School will be converted to a middle school in the 2014-15 school year. District officials appointed a committee to write a schedule; committee members delivered their first report at a recent Moses Lake School Board meeting.

The still-unnamed school will have the same core classes as Frontier and Chief Moses middle schools, district superintendent Michelle Price said. The elective schedule is still to be determined. The committee was looking for ways to attract kids, and thought that a focus on STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) classes would be attractive to parents, Chief Moses science teacher Kelly Frederick said. Committee chair and CBSS principal James Yonko said the proposed elective schedule also would include foreign language and AVID (a college readiness program) classes.

The proposal includes project-based STEM classes, and would emphasize individual inquiry and some collaboration. Steve Banda, the assistant principal at Frontier, said the new school would have 240 to 300 students. The new school would have the same seven-period day as the other middle schools, Banda said. Kids would have more elective choices as they progressed through school, he said. Students who are struggling in core classes would have enhanced intervention built into their schedules, Banda said.

In other business, Price announced that a transition team to prepare a year-round school schedule won't be in place until early 2015.

Price was answering a question from Victoria Lugo, who lives near North Elementary School. Lugo asked when district officials anticipated switching to year-round school, and whether the committee working on the transition would include district patrons. Board chair Connie Opheikens said currently district officials are implementing new teacher and administrative evaluation programs, a new achievement test, a new schedule at the high school, establishing the new middle school and making a schedule for the high school students who previously attended CBSS. With those projects ongoing, district officials decided against starting another committee, since year-round school won't begin until 2015-16 at the earliest, Opheikens said.

Lugo also asked about the fence outside North, and said it encroaches on her property. Opheikens directed the administration to keep working with Lugo.

Administrator Dave Balcom reported that the district's digital instruction program grew to about 200 students.

Balcom said the program was envisioned as a safety net, a way for kids who needed a few credits to get them. But most students in the program are not using that way, he said.

The online program has grown so much that a part-time instructor will be added in January, he said. Opheikens asked if district officials had a limit on the number of students allowed, since the program is growing. Balcom said administrators have been talking about that, but haven't come to a conclusion.