New principals at Othello, Desert Oasis high schools

OTHELLO — Othello High School has a new principal, Desert Oasis High School has a new-old principal, and Wahitis Elementary has a new interim principal. Those changes, occurring at the end of the first semester last week, prompted some questions from the high school representatives to the Othello School Board.

The board was scheduled to meet Monday, but didn’t have a quorum. The two board members in attendance discussed unofficial reports. That included questions from Kaiden Quigley and Kiera Stansall, the board’s two student representatives.

Former OHS principal Russell Kovalenko moved back to his old job as principal of Desert Oasis at the end of the first semester, replaced at OHS by Wahitis Elementary principal Alejandro Vergara. Kiera said students were confused about the change, and wondered what it means. “We kind of don’t know where we stand yet,” Kaiden said.

Board member Rob Simmons said word of the students’ concerns can be passed back to Vergara.

After the meeting district superintendent Chris Hurst said he decided to rearrange administrative positions to make better use of the district’s administrators and their talents. Former Desert Oasis principal Vance Frost was moved to the district’s career and technical education department. Wahitis assistant principal Justin Johnson took the Wahitis principal’s job on an interim basis.

Hurst reported district officials have scheduled two snow makeup days, May 26 and June 9. The district lost a number of days to snow and ice during the first three weeks of January.

“Right now, graduation is not affected,” Hurst said.

Washington education policy allows schools some leeway in making up days lost to bad weather, if the cancellations meet certain criteria. The superintendents in ESD 123 weren’t sure the cancellations this month fit that criteria, Hurst said, but proclamations from Governor Jay Inslee indicated they did. Othello schools had three days that qualified, he said.

The state does require kids to be in school a minimum of 1,027 hours, and that requirement must be met no matter what. Hurst said district officials are looking at all the remaining school year to see where time might be recaptured. Those include days (and hours) set aside for teacher training, parent conferences, late start or early release days.

Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.