High school enrollment has declined and district-wide enrollment is almost the same as last year. I saw this coming, and I questioned the need for a $56 million bond earlier this year. Today, I am opposed to using the SMS building for the high school when there is no replacement middle school, because that would create significant middle school overcrowding and because it is not supported by high school enrollment needs. I have fully supported efforts for years to provide more interventions to help freshman students succeed, but, we do not need a separate building to do so. I believe we need to analyze enrollment again to determine when (and if) we will exceed capacity before making or continuing any major building use or bond decision. Our community and our kids deserve a better process.
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Welcome. I hope this website helps you learn more about my passion for education and why I want to serve on the school board. I am dedicated to raising the bar for student success, community planning and transparency. This interactive website will keep you updated with stories from the campaign trail and election updates via the Campaign Blog and Calendar on the Home page and will be responsive to your questions. I encourage your comments, and I appreciate your support so very much. Thank you.Carolyn’s Calendar
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Thursday, November 3, 6:00pm Work Session; 7:30pm - School Board Meeting, District Office
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Campaign Blog Topics
Mrs. Carolyn Simpson,
It seems as if no one has asked us 7th grade students, who will be impacted by the 9th grade campus, what we want. We don’t want to stay away from high school for another extra year. We have unique development needs??? No, not really. We went from elementary school to middle school to get our development needs. We are ready for high school and we want to be apart of it! The 9th grade campus doesn’t seem like it’s going to be giving us opportunities like the high school would. What about honor students? Are they going to be slowed down? What about the kids who want to learn more languages? Would they get to? And what about the kids who want to participate in the sports? Do we go over to the high school between classes for languages, honor classes, cooking classes, etc? We would need more minutes in between classes to get to walk to the high school, that would mean longer days or shorter classes and what would the kids who don’t have to go far of their classes be doing in between all that time? Could you provide us students with more information? We have already started a petition and half of the 7th graders that will be first to go to the 9th grade campus have already signed it.
Please get back to me,
-Future 9th grader
Hi Katie,
Thank you so much for the email and the text. You have the same questions that I have. I am trying to get the answers to these same questions, because they are very important to me. I think that we need to find out the answers to all of these questions and to talk with parents, students, and teachers about this freshman campus before we proceed. This freshman campus is a big change from what we are doing now, and we should all understand it before we go forward.
Last night, I was outvoted. I was hoping I could convince the other board members to spend more time talking with you and others in our community, but the vote resulted in 3 for going ahead and 2 of us saying “no”. I also wanted to get more information from Mr. Belcher about how this is all going to work. I think it is very very important to talk with you and other students and parents, as well as all teachers at the middle and high school levels, about this freshman campus before we decide to go forward. The good news is that we have some time still to talk about this, and see if we can get the answers to your questions and to my questions and other questions from the community and work together to make this option one that you will like.
My kids are in college now, but they are Mount Si graduates (go Wildcats!). I have talked with them about this and they would have had the same questions that you have.
I want to hear more about your concerns. If you would like to schedule a time that I could meet with you and the rest of the students that are working on this petition, I would be very happy to meet with you and your parents.
I am so glad you contacted me,
Carolyn