Monday, April 29, 2013
If the state grants approval, Lakeville would become the first district in the metro area to offer a full-time virtual option to its students.
The Lakeville Area School District is hoping to start a full-time online K-12 program in the fall. Lakeville Schools Superintendent Lisa Snyder told Sun Thisweek that if the state approves the district's plan, it would become the first district in the metro to offer its students a full-time virtual education alternative. “It’s part of our vision of personalized learning for all students,” she told the paper. “One size doesn’t fit all anymore.” Classes would be capped at 40 students and the program would offer electives including art and physical education. All students would receive a Google Chromebook, a Gmail account and access to online software system that would allow for PowerPoint presentations, videos and discussion threads. “We …
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Superintendent Lisa Snyder will warn voters that unless they vote in more funding in a fall levy, the district will be forced to make major curricular cuts.
With a projected $5 million to $7 million budget deficit for the 2014-15 school year, Lisa Snyder, the superintendent of Lakeville Area Public Schools, feels that District 194's financial situation is dire, and she's appealing directly to voters, asking for more money. "We want to talk to the community about our financial situation and our vision for the future," she told the Pioneer Press. "We need their support to get there." The district is considering a levy request in the fall that would ask voters to pay up to $500 more per pupil. So Snyder's embarking on a small speaking tour, which will include two "State of the Schools" addresses and speeches to local clubs and community groups, the Pioneer Press is reporting. Without more money, …
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
Schmitty & Sons, a local school bus operator, earned a perfect score in the annual state inspection.
Schmitty & Sons, the private Lakeville school bus company that has operated in the city since 1952, earned a perfect score on the annual state school bus inspections. Minnesota school buses must be expected annually by the Minnesota State Patrol. Schmitty has more in a press release: Minnesota's school bus inspection program is based on a point value system devised to evaluate the condition of each bus that is operated in the State of Minnesota. Each school bus begins with 100 total points. As defects are discovered during the inspection process, points are deducted in accordance with values assigned in Minnesota Rule 7470.0700 "Table of points to be deducted". School buses with an inspection score of 96 to 100 pass the inspection and an …
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
A study by the Minnesota Campaign for Achievement Now graded all Lakeville schools in the categories of student performance, subgroup performance, performance gains and achievement gap.
Students of color at Lakeville schools are doing better academically than minorities in many districts across the state—but the percentage of Lakeville minority students meeting proficiency standards is still 20 percentage points lower than that of their white classmates, according to a new study. While Minnesota's public schools excel in test scores, the achievement gaps between white kids and students of color, and between low-income and high-income students, are still significantly larger than national averages. Black and Latino eighth-graders lag 37 percentage points behind their white peers in math. Low-income eight-graders trail their richer classmates by 32 percentage points. In a March report, the Minnesota Campaign for Achievement…
Saturday, March 30, 2013
Administrators, support staff and a handful of teachers will be let go as the district looks to trim next year's budget.
(Editor's note: a previous version of this story included two errors—suggesting the School Board cut one of the district's high school athletic directors, and cut 2.77 full-time equivalency elementary school physical education teachers. While both of those line items were on previous lists of budget cuts, they were NOT included in the approved cuts last week. Patch regrets the error.) Administrators, support staff, and a handful of teachers are among the $3.5 million in budget adjustments and cuts Lakeville's School Board approved this week after months of deliberation and discussion. While the cuts were intended to minimize impact in the classroom, half of the district's eight elementary school counselors will be let go, saving $300,000, …
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
The program will have room for 108 students in year one, with registration beginning in April.
Despite a bit of controversy, Lakeville's School Board approved a plan Tuesday to offer the Impact Academy for grades K-3 at Orchard Lake Elementary School beginning this fall. The pilot program has been a source of contention for weeks with teachers and parents expressing concern they, or their students, may be pushed out of the school if the academy was implemented. The district held several public meetings to hear from constituents and staff were held to answer questions. The Impact Academy is a significant departure from traditional learning, in many ways. The cost-neutral pilot program will group students by their skill level in reading, math and writing, instead of age or grade. It allows students to learn, and grow, at their own …
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Holly Ryan, a school psychologist at Lakeville's Kenwood Trail Middle School, flew to her hometown of Newtown, CT, along with a service dog, to help victims of the tragedy cope.
Like us on Facebook | Follow us on Twitter | Sign up for our newsletter For Holly Ryan, Dec. 14, 2012, was a typical, busy Friday. It wasn't until later that she learned half a country away, her hometown of Newtown, CT, had become the site of the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history. Ryan, 40, a school psychologist at Lakeville's Kenwood Trail Middle School, says text messages from her mother and sister first alerted her to the tragedy that unfolded. "I think the events are still unimaginable in their entirety," Ryan said. "There are just so many personal accounts—families directly and indirectly affected—it's overwhelming." Ryan grew up in Newtown. She lived there until she was 20, she said. And while she and he family moved …
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
The decrease is larger than expected thanks to some debt refinancing.
Homeowners in Lakeville have had some decent news this month on the property tax front. First, the City Council announced that property taxes would be going down slightly in 2013. Now, the school district is singing the same tune. Thanks to the refinancing of millions in debt, the district will save roughly $1 million in debt-service through 2021. As for its impact on this year's levy, Mark Klett, the district's director of business services, said the proposed 2013 tax levy will be $31.8 million—down an additional $300,000 from the September proposed budget of $32.1 million. All told, that marks a 0.9 percent reduction to the levy from 2012, meaning the school portion of property taxes on the average home—valued at $230,300—will be going …
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Did you decorate your house for the holidays this year? Enter our "Deck the House" contest and you could win $100,000 for your school district, and/or $500 to pay your electric bills!
Patch is launching our annual Deck the House Contest to find the most over-the-top holiday decorations in America—the best “decked” house in the country—the one home so spectacularly decorated that everyone in town jokes your holiday decorations could rival Rockefeller Center’s. If this sounds like your house, upload a photo or video of your home to our contest page from Nov. 26 to Dec. 16 to deckthehouse.patch.com/contest/lakeville. Only residents of Patch towns are eligible to enter. We’ll select 24 regional finalists, and from them, pick one grand prize winner. Patch will pay up to $500 of the utility bill for each finalist, while our national winner will have $100,000 donated to his or her local school district. So why not Lakeville? …
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Lakeville's School Board has two meetings this week—its regular meeting and a special session.
Lakeville's School Board has two meetings on Tuesday, and both are doozies. At 5 p.m. on Tuesday at the district office, the School Board will hold a special session where the group will discuss a number of items, the most notable being next year's academic calendar, which could be trimmed by two or three educational days, as requested by Education Minnesota Lakeville, the district's teacher's union. At 7 p.m. the board will begin its regular meeting where the 2012 payable 2013 tax levy will be certified. In addition, the board will hear reports on 2013-2014 enrollment, high school program of studies, and the 2012 summer programming report. Both meetings are open to the public. Also on Tuesday—and the only other meeting this week—the city'…
Terry Elliott
4:32 pm on Tuesday, April 30, 2013
I believe this is only a halfway step, at best. This is "online" but it is a captive model, in that the teachers are within the district. The future is online learning with students able to access the best say, 200 math teachers or history teachers in the country-- not the same small audience of teachers in their local district. (I just completed a 19-week online college history course with … more ›