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Show expires 013089 7'r f BOOKBINDERY, INC. K N HOB STREET RINBPORT W N Vol. 10, No. Wednesday, March 2, 1988 50 cents a single copy fpG Jr. High to change next year Xhe Alpine School Board has .nproved the productivity proposal ,resented by Pleasant Grove Junior jjgh School for the 1988-8- 9 school 'ear. N The proposal is similar to one f.fhich has been in use at American ork Junior High School and will nake it possible for the school to setter facilitate the increased Enrollment expected in the next few 1'ears. The school administration stimated that without the productivity program they would ave to bring in more portables, increase the number of teachers, tc The majority of teachers are in avor of the productivity proposal .nd the teachers will receive a ubstantial pay raise in the "Vogram. With the productivity method the teachers will all teach seven periods day and be paid an extra of their yearly salary for his additional period of teaching. They will be paid their regular Tontract wage for fifteen additional "flays of preparation time in the Summer piror to the first year of peration. The 15 days will be spent --n inservice activities on the rocedures of Mastery Learning, decision Teaching, Quality Circles, jid preparation of lesson plans and caching materials for the coming lear. Beginning with the second year of '"reluctivity, teachers will be paid heir regular contract wage for an ddiltional half hour each day to rovide additional preparation time. E- Teacher contract time would be :om 7:30 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. with chool in operation from 8:30 a.m. ntil3p.m. i An incentive bonus of $500 will be aid to each teacher at the con- - lusion of the year if the outlined oals are met for the school. I An annual evaluation of teachers and testing of students will help the district to know if the productivity plan is working. The program calls for a teacher-stude-ration of 1 to 34. Classes that can field more students, over 34, will, but those which cannot will not have that many students. Studies made at American Fork Junior High have shown that student achievement was not effected nor was the morale or attendance of students or staff on the productivity program. There is good evidence to show that the model functions well and does in fact allow more students to be housed in the school plant with fewer teachers to provide a quality educational experience. Forty-on- e teachers will be needed with the productivity program whereas otherwise 51 would have been hired for the upcoming school year. The savings of teachers will total ten teachers or $246,190. Reducing the staff by three teachers will be accomplished through voluntary transfer and not hiring teachers for growth. Pleasant Grove Junior High was built for 1,000 students. There are now 1,300. The planned addition, which should be constructed by next fall sometime, would add seven classrooms and then the school could facilitate 1,200 officially, which is still less than they have now. The projected enrollment shows that by 1994 the school would have a total of 1,556 students. Principal Kent Rowley has said that they are not proposing that the productivity program is a better teaching method because it is not. The productivity plan is considered to be the best solution to a financial need, however, and the students will still receive a good education. ; r - ' I . X . ' Paul T. Johanson S $ ' ty ': i ; (. 7, Sally Turner I 1 , y. Tamara Thurgood Tit : '' '' ' f Jenifer Smith i 'A I j y Devyn Smith Suzanne Draney Ron Arnold 1988 Sterling Scholars See story l'age 3 T j I Kylee Young 'I - yC ' j Jeana Starr '"' ""'"'"'" I Will Kimball '. - ' 7 ' ' I j Janilyn Patch Greenwood proposes year-roEn- d schedule for 1988-8- 9 Greenwood Elementary may be I a year-roun- d schedule for the act school year. Greenwood is one of two Alpine ihool District schools that joined e ranks seeking changes in the aditional school year. Representatives from Greenwood id Vineyard Elementary in Orem esented extended year proposals school board members during eir Feb. 23 meeting held at Central lementary in Pleasant Grove. Both schools would follow schedules similar to those at other district schools now on year-roun- d schedules. Bruce Wathen, Greenwood Elementary principal, said their proposal differs in that kindergarten and first grade students would follow a traditional schedule, at-tending school for the regular nine-mont-of the year and taking a three-mont- h summer break. "We felt that kindergarten and first grade students weren't ready for the extended year schedule," Wathen said. He said staff members felt the "three week bicak wasn't for the best to meet the needs of these young students." Students in grades two through six at Greenwood, and all students at Vineyard, will attend school through 11 months on one of five rotating tracks. The first three tracks will begin classwork on Aug. 1, with the remaining tracks beginning three weeks later. Kindergarten and first grade students will begin on Aug. 29 -- - the regular starting date. Most parents at Greenwood support the extended-yea- r program rather than the extended-da- y program in operation in several other area schools. One Greenwood teacher told board members school officials and parents researched extended-da- y and extended-yea-r schedules by visiting other schools that had them. Many people became involved in the process, but not everyone agreed with the decision to choose the ext-ended- year schedule. "It really became an emotional issue at our school, and it became emotional because it affected the teachers' lives," he said. "But they'll make it work, because they're dedicated." A survey of the teachers showed 66 percent favored the extended year program, while 34 percent wanted an extended-da- y schedule. No teachers have asked to transferred from the school. Pam Blackhurst, representing the parents, said about 425 families whose children attend Greenwood were contacted to determine their preference. Of these 305 prefered the extended year program over the extended day. See GREENWOOD on page 3 Hearing to air training school laundry plan 1 y:: .;' ! t nn, Mf ...... - f I 7 'j'm' x , 1 - ' ., , A " I I S ' ; rN "u - V- - - - f W'-- I , . - K - Employees at the Utah State raining School laundry see an pcoming public hearing and a leeting with the American Fork ity Council as the last two chances i save their jobs. But a spokesman for Utah correctional Industries (UCI), the 'IWernment agency that has offered i operate the laundry with inmate ibor, said his organization has been ssured there are job opportunities each of the 23 people who will be lSiplaced if the proposal goes jirough. Laundry employees have asked a place on the American Fork ity Council agenda for their March meeting. Also a public hearing is scheduled tarch 17 on the proposal. Directed a1 the Utah Corrections Industries, "jie hearing will be at 7 p.m. in. the 4iditorium on the campus of the r aining school. The board of the Utah Division of Jrvices to the Handicapped voted nanimously at their Feb. 24 meeting to approve a plan to use f lmates from the prison to operate ,r,ie laundry - the first step towards v trying out the plan. Officials said the public hearing as not scheduled prior to the DSH scision because if the board turned "own, there would be no need for hearing. Jerry Dandoy, training school 'Perintendent, told board members restate can save some $177,000 by lving the laundry operated by UCI. He said it costs 20 cents per pound do laundry at the training school w. This would be reduced to 13.7 ;nts under the proposal. 'Dandoy said that 23.5 full-tim- e --''tions at the laundry would be Five of those could be hired by ijjpi to help continue operating the ""dry, but they will have to fcome certified correctional of-fers. iNone of the laundry employees, Pm the director down, are eligible J ' days to work out the transition. In addition to moving in UCI personnel to operate the laundry facility, a 10- - to fence will be erected around the laundry - "to keep clients and staff from mingling with the inmates," Clasby said. Inmates will be bused to and from the laundry, and kept inside the laundry throughout the day. "It will be as secure a compound as you can find anywhere in the country for this type of operation," Clasby said. "Actually, we are overkilling the security. Level 5 inmates (the type which would be used in the laundry) don't need the kind of security we would be putting in." Clasby said Level 5 inmates already have home visit status for the weekends. But laundry employees are skeptical about how much the state will save by using inmate labor to operate the facility. Jack Wise, a member of the laundry staff, read a letter for the DSH board dated Feb. 5 in which the employees questioned the amount of savings that could be realized. Wise pointed out that costs to operate the laundry are about $400,000 a year. He said this seems high compared to the projected prison labor cost of $150,000 but the prison does not have matching funds like the training school has. For every dollar spent, the training school supplies 26 cents and the federal government 74 cents. Of the $400,000 labor cost, the state provides approximately $104,000. Wise said actually this is much less than the prison proposal. Wise also questioned security, and asked what would happen if there is a lockdown at the prison. He also noted there are 10 in-dividuals with handicaps from the Northern Utah Training Center who now work at the laundry and earn small salaries. These jobs will be eliminated if UCI takes over the laundry because the individuals with handicaps could not with prisoners. "These workshop people are learning skills," Wise said. Training school employees and the Utah Public Employees Association protested the move, saying there were security problems, that savings would not be as high as the proposal indicated, and that 23 training school employees would be put out of work. Board members agreed to have the program evaluated after six months and after a year, with an accounting of the savings made. Women prisoners have been used in several buildings at the training school for the past several years, according to Ora Peterson, a former employee of the training school Mrs. Peterson, who was over the inmate program nearly from it's beginning until she retired last year, said the prisoners were closely supervised and they had very little behavior problems. "You had to be on your toes all the time, however," she said. Women in the program were those who had nearly completed their prison term. The big problem, she said, was they were not dependable, and buildings where the women worked found themselves shorthanded. "If they had a lockdown at the prison, or there weren't enough guards to bring them, or they would get sick, or something else would come up, then we ended up shor-thanded -- - and we didn't have any notice. "Sometimes only one out of 15 would show up," Mrs. Peterson said. But Clasby said that in the five years he had been with UCI, "we have not had a single day when we have had to shut an operation down." Clasby said UCI would meet its contractual agreements, even if it See LAUNDRY on page 3 Employees at Utah State Training School laundry press and fold towels with machine. The facility is the center of controversy as Utah Corrections Industries has proposed using inmate labor to operate facility. to "bump" anyone else in the state since they are classified employees, he said. Ten of the employees are 56 years of age and older, he said, and two are 65 or older and are probably eligible for retirement. Dandoy said there are always openings in direct-car- e at the in-stitution, and laundry personnel could apply for these if they desire. "They probably would want to take those positions," he said. He said he would like to see if "reduction in force" regulations could be open statewide so these people might have an opportunity for other jobs in the state system in their line of work. "These employees do not have the right to a job, but we could have positions for all 23 in direct-car- e jobs." Richard Clasby, with UCI, said in a telephone interview, "We have been assured that there are jobs for all the people who will be replaced, and at comparable pay." Dandoy said Monday he expects the proposal to be in place July "unless there are some significant changes. "We are going ahead with starting to draft up the memo of agreement," he said. But the signing of the memo will wait until after the March 17 public hearing. Comments from the hearing will go to the director of the Department of Corrections and the director of the Department of Social Services, who will make the final decision on the change. Clasby said once the agreement is formalized, he expects it will take 60 |