School programs move buildings

By Denise Dick

denise_dick@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

Stephen Stohla, interim Youngstown City Schools superintendent, says student safety is the main objective in the latest change in school building use.

The district’s two third-through-eighth-grade choice schools – Discovery at Kirkmere and Discovery at Volney – will be combined this school year at Kirkmere.

Initially the plan had been to move Discovery 3, a seventh- and eighth-grade program with a career-tech emphasis, from East High School, where it was this past school year, to the fourth floor of Choffin Career and Technical Center.

Stohla said those seventh- and eighth-graders will instead be moved to Volney.

“This truly is safety-driven,” he said at a Monday school board meeting.

The alternative was reached by a committee that included building principals and district administrators, Stohla said.

“I want to get the most use out of the buildings that are underutilized,” he said.

The interim superintendent said school board members heard from parents who were concerned about the younger students being housed in the same building with older students.

There were other issues too.

“There’s only two toilets for 125 girls,” he said.

Choffin has no gymnasium, so students would have to walk or be transported elsewhere for that course.

The new plan also will eliminate the need to hire a building principal. The principal at Discovery at Kirkmere resigned to take a job in another district. Combining the two programs means that position doesn’t have to be filled. An assistant principal still will be needed in that building, though, Stohla said.

In other business, the school board approved the job description for an assistant superintendent.

That individual, who will earn between $109,000 and $125,000 annually, will replace two other district posts.

Douglas Hiscox, deputy superintendent for academic affairs, is retiring, effective July 31. He has accepted a job at the Mahoning County Educational Service Center. He’s been with the district since late 2010 and previously worked in the district in the 1990s.

Karen Green, assistant superintendent of human resources, resigned last month to take a position in another school district. She worked in the city district for 29 years.

No one has been selected to fill the newly created job.