Cell phones, security systems, school buses, and more were on the docket at Parkland High School on Tuesday morning as Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools leaders held a press conference ahead of the first day of school on Monday, August 12.
The first day of school is coming a bit early this year after the Board of Education adopted an adjusted academic calendar to better meet the needs of students and their families, so district leaders want to make sure everyone is prepared for a few significant changes that will take effect in 2024-25. Perhaps most notable is the cell phone policy the board recently approved, which prohibits students from using electronic devices like phones, music players, gaming systems, etc. during the school day, with exceptions for high schoolers during lunch periods. The policy was crafted with extensive feedback from students, parents, and educators in mind, and the hope is that eliminating these distractions in the classroom will encourage students to engage more closely with their curriculum and their school culture. Jonathan Sidden and Walter Johnson, the new co-principals of Parkland, spoke in support of the policy and said that the changes it will yield in the classroom will be common-sense improvements, even if it does take some time to break old habits.
“What the board has implemented is nothing new for us,” Johnson said. “It’s what schools should have been doing all along… it’s just us sharing and resharing what was already expected.”
Student security remains a top priority going into the new school year, and Chief Officer of Safety and Security Jonathan Wilson spoke at the press conference about advances in metal detector practices for the district. Security staff increased the frequency of random metal detector use in the mornings at the end of the 2023-24 school year, and they will maintain that pace this year to better deter future incidents. The district has enough traditional walkthrough metal detectors at all its middle and high schools that it no longer needs to move them between campuses, but this year, it will also benefit from the use of eight OPENGATE metal detector systems, which utilize two lightweight wire-free pillars that scan for metal at specific concentrations and produce zero to few nuisance alarms. Wilson hopes that these new devices will be game changers for minimizing the time and effort required to get students into the building safely.
“We should be able to get students in three or four times faster with one of these,” Wilson said. “No matter which one we use, we have to have staff, but those OPENGATEs will require much less staff.”
Transportation is always a key concern, especially at the beginning of the school year, but the operations department has been hard at work making the bussing process more intuitive for students and families. This year, the district is replacing the Here Comes the Bus app with the Edulog Bus Portal, which will offer real-time updates every three seconds on bus routes and changes in schedules. The new app is already available for download on iOS and Android, and families that plan to utilize school buses are encouraged to download it as soon as possible. Senior Executive Director of Transportation Tisha Davidson says that the results of a pilot program with the app held at Smith Farm Elementary School garnered a lot of positive feedback from parents, but the district will still be in constant contact with Edulog to make sure the frustration experienced last year is minimized this year.
“The system that we had prior had a lot of service issues,” Davidson said. “We have daily meetings with Edulog, and we will continue to have those… we have 24-hour access to the people we need to have access to.”
As of Tuesday morning, there are 55 vacancies for bus drivers throughout WS/FCS – an improvement from last year, but still a noteworthy shortage. Davidson asks for patience as the transportation team continues working to resolve issues with bus routes. Patience will be a virtue all around the district as new policies are implemented and refined. At the end of the day, staff in all positions will do their best to make school enjoyable and rewarding for all of the district’s stakeholders. There’s no more exciting time for educators than the beginning of the school year.
“We’ve been working hard this summer to prepare because of the tightened window,” said Superintendent Tricia McManus. “We’re counting the days because we cannot wait.”