WestChesterBuzz.com

To let West Chester and Liberty Township residents catch up with the news that they need to know, WestChesterBuzz.com will list and link to all of last week’s top local stories every Monday.

MetroParks breaks ground on VOA athletic complex – The Butler County Visitors Bureau and MetroParks of Butler County held an official ground breaking ceremony last Wednesday for their $3 million project that will add 22 multipurpose natural grass athletic fields on 100 acres of Voice of America Park in West Chester Township. The fields, which border Butler-Warren and Tylersville roads, are expected to be available for use by September of 2014.

Lakota Local Schools maintains rating – Michael D. Clark reported on the annual Ohio Report Cards – Southwest Ohio’s second-largest school system maintained its top state ranking while the area’s longest financially embattled district finally dropped a category, according to the annual Ohio Report Cards, released last Wednesday. Butler County’s Lakota Schools earned an Excellent with Distinction rating despite historically deep budget cuts in recent years.

BAE to sell commercial armored vehicles business – In a $10 million deal, defense contractor BAE Systems announced it is selling off its locally based commercial armored vehicles business that employs 134 workers, Alexander Coolidge of The Cincinnati Enquirer reported last Tuesday.

Zoning Commission approves ‘high end’ apartments in West Chester – Last week, the West Chester Zoning Commission approved two proposed apartment developments that could possibly feature rents greater than $1,200 per month. One of those developments, currently called The Cascades, will have its zoning change go before the West Chester Township Board of Trustees on Nov. 13.

White House Inn becomes Casa Bianca – The owner of Symmes Tavern in Fairfield has bought the venerable White House Inn in West Chester and has turned it into an Italian restaurant, Polly Campbell of the Cincinnati Enquirer reported last week. The name is simply a translation: Casa Bianca. The restaurant will have traditional Italian and traditional American on the menu.

Colerain defeats Lakota West in battle of unbeatens – In a battle of the top two teams in The Cincinnati Enquirer coaches’ poll, senior quarterback Alfred “L.A.” Ramsby carried Colerain from an early 17-0 deficit to a 57-44 win against Lakota West at Cardinal Stadium on a wet and chilly night in Colerain Township.

Supreme Court OK’s Ohio early voting – The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for Ohioans to cast early in-person absentee ballots on the final three days before the Nov. 6 election, Barry M. Horstman of The Cincinnati Enquirer reported last Tuesday.

Bridge replacement on Rialto Road is complete – The Butler County Engineer’s Office announced last Tuesday that Rialto Road in West Chester Township is now open. A portion of the road had been closed since early July as the Rialto Road bridge over Mill Creek was replaced.

Lakota teen’s been to Barrackville and Romney – Matthew King, a 17-year-old Lakota East High school senior, recently created a Youtube Video highlighting two small towns in America, that just so happened to be named Romney and Barrackville. In the video, King talks to people on the street, through car windows, and people putting groceries in their cars about their views on the towns name, asking questions with only slight political implications.

Phoenix will phase out West Chester, Florence campuses – The University of Phoenix will phase out classes in West Chester and Florence, impacting 236 students, Cliff Peale of The Cincinnati Enquirer reported last week. The sites have stopped accepting applications, and current students will have the choice of finishing their programs in traditional classrooms or converting to online classes.

Posted in: Business, News, Schools, Sports |

Tags: Tags: athletic complex, BAE Systems, Casa Bianca, Casa Bianca West Chester Ohio, Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Lakota, Lakota Excellent with Distinction, Lakota schools, Liberty Township business news, MetroParks, MetroParks of Butler County, Voice of America, Voice of America Park, Voice of America Park athletic complex, West Chester business, West Chester business news, West Chester Development Council, West Chester jobs, West Chester restaurants, West Chester Township Zoning Commission, White House Inn, White House Inn West Chester Ohio

Trouble reading this? Click on this link: Lakota Schools state ratings

Michael D. Clark reports:

Southwest Ohio’s second-largest school system maintained its top state ranking while the area’s longest financially embattled district finally dropped a category, according to the annual Ohio Report Cards, released Wednesday.

Butler County’s Lakota Schools earned an Excellent with Distinction rating despite historically deep budget cuts in recent years.

And Warren County’s state-controlled Little Miami Schools dropped one category, from Excellent to Effective, after three previous school years of the higher rating. Those excellent rankings came during a stretch from 2008 through 2011 when the state-designated “fiscal emergency” district was cutting millions in personnel and programs while losing eight consecutive tax levies at the ballot.

Being forced by the state into academic minimums as part of Little Miami’s financial recovery plan, which was bolstered by voters’ levy passage in fall 2011, finally took its toll on the district’s rating, said Superintendent Greg Power. In 2010 the district was ordered by the state into fiscal emergency.

Power said the lack of staff and dollars to commit to on-going, high-quality curriculum revision and professional development all played into the rating decline.

Little Miami met 25 out of 26 indicators on student data, but did not meet its “Adequate Yearly Progress” target number for the second year in a row, resulting in the downgrade.

Officials at Lakota – the eighth-largest district in Ohio – said their streak of 11 years of earning the state’s highest ranking may also be brought down by financial woes and deep budget cuts that are now in place for the 2012-2013 school year.

“When someone says we cut the budget by millions and the results are still just as good, we need to remember these (state) results are from last (school) year. We had many teachers who helped our kids learn this material who are not here anymore,” said Lakota Superintendent Karen Mantia.

Mason Schools, the largest district in Warren County, dropped from Excellent with Distinction to Excellent but district officials months ago announced that they were joining nine other districts in Hamilton and Clermont counties in creating their own annual report cards. Officials from the highly rated districts say the locally generated grade cards – when combined with annual state grading – will provide a more comprehensive and detailed measure of their annual performance than that provided by the annual state rankings.

Mason officials, however, touted their continued ranking among the top-10 of Ohio’s 613 districts, according to their performance index rating – 110.3 – and said that mark was achieved while spending $2,444 less per pupil than the other top-10 districts.

The 9,700-student Fairfield Schools in Butler County met all 26 indicators on last school year’s report card and raised its rating from Effective to Excellent.

“We are very excited about the excellent rating,” said Superintendent Paul Otten. “We also realize that there is still work to be done.”

The only other district in Southwest Ohio to fall into fiscal emergency and state control – Monroe Schools in Butler County – maintained its Excellent rating despite coming under state governorship earlier this year.

Posted in: Board of Education, Levy news, News, Schools |

Tags: Tags: Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Lakota East, Lakota High School, Lakota schools, Lakota Superintendent Dr. Karen Mantia, Lakota West, Lakota West High School, Superintendent Dr. Karen Mantia, superintendent Karen Mantia

The Enquirer:

Despite historically deep budget cuts and the layoffs of dozens of teachers, Lakota Local Schools continued its streak of earning the state’s top academic rating of Excellent with Distinction when the Ohio Department of Education released the 2011-12 preliminary report card ratings Wednesday for schools and districts.

Lakota is the second largest district in Southwest Ohio and the seventh biggest in the state.

“When someone says we cut the budget by millions and the results are still just as good, we need to remember these results are from last year. We had many teachers who helped our kids learn this material who are not here anymore,” said Lakota Superintendent Karen Mantia.

More information coming to WestChesterBuzz.com as it comes available.

Posted in: Board of Education, Levy news, News, Schools |

Tags: Tags: Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Lakota schools, Lakota Superintendent Dr. Karen Mantia, Superintendent Dr. Karen Mantia, superintendent Karen Mantia

The Enquirer:

Ohio will be handing out state report card ratings for districts and schools Oct. 17, state officials said Tuesday, now that State Auditor Dave Yost’s investigations into enrollment and attendance manipulation is winding down for 100 schools around the state.

Each year, usually in late summer, the state publicizes report cards that rate districts and schools on a six-level scale; the highest rated are called “Excellent with Distinction,” then Excellent, while the lowest rated are dubbed “Academic Emergency” and the slightly better Academic Watch.

But those labels and the calculations behind them were lacking late last month, when Ohio held back state report cards and instead released only a spreadsheet describing student scores on state achievement tests and graduation averages for high schools. State officials said they’d rather wait for Yost to finish examining records at the 100 schools with the highest numbers of student withdrawals.

Most of those schools, including some in Cincinnati, were declared “clean” of data manipulation last week. Some school results were “indeterminate” because investigations weren’t complete, including schools in Cincinnati, Princeton and Hamilton City Schools districts.

Despite that, most report card data for all schools will be released on a preliminary basis next week, said John Charlton, Ohio education department spokesman. That will include the 120-point Performance Index – a measure of test scores that allows for schools and districts to be ranked against each other – and attendance rates for all Ohio schools and districts.

State report card ratings are important, often affecting whether the public approves new school taxes or reelects sitting school board members. The report card feed perceptions about school quality.

Posted in: News, Schools |

Tags: Tags: Academic Emergency, Academic Watch, Continuous Improvement, Effective, Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Graduation Test, school district report cards, state school board

Michael D. Clark reports:

Ohio’s much-anticipated annual school district report cards will be delayed until at least September after a unanimous and unprecedented vote Monday by the state school board.

Ohio School Board President Debe Terhar of Green Township said an ongoing state investigation into the validity of data from local districts has cast a shadow on this year’s results.

“We need to make sure the data we have is accurate,” Terhar told The Enquirer.

Terhar said she communicated her concerns to the Ohio Department of Education last week and officials there agreed that the Ohio Auditor’s investigation, which includes that state education department, should first be completed.

“Some rankings could be inaccurate and without the auditor’s report it would be premature to release them,” she said.

The latest round annual academic rankings, which for the 2011-12 school year were scheduled for release Aug. 29, are the single most important rating of Ohio’s 614 public school systems.

The report cards are measurements of students’ performance on key academic indicators, including achievement test scores, graduation rates and Ohio Graduation Test scores. The six ratings, from top to bottom: Excellent with Distinction, Excellent, Effective, Continuous Improvement, Academic Watch and Academic Emergency.

The delay in rankings could affect high school students statewide who are applying for college admission and financial aid this fall, as well as teachers and administrators whose contractual “step pay” increases may be tied to their district rating.

Rankings are also key when local schools are seeking new school tax revenue and trying to persuade voters by pointing to top or stable state rankings.

The report cards give parents and other members of the public a snapshot of each school’s year-over-year performance and how it compares with state education standards.

Building rankings drawn from the reports help determine whether students are eligible for the EdChoice program, which provides vouchers for private schools to students at consistently underperforming public schools. (more…)

Posted in: Schools |

Tags: Tags: Academic Emergency, Academic Watch, Continuous Improvement, Debe Terhar, Effective, Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Ohio Department of Education, Ohio Graduation Test, Ohio School Board President Debe Terhar, school district report cards, state school board

For the 10th consecutive year, the Lakota school district will receive a rating of Excellent or better from the state. According to a release from the school district, Lakota students met 26 out of the 26 indicators for testing as well as improved its performance index from last year’s 104.2 to 105.9.

“This is no small achievement. I understand and recognize what this means in our team’s daily work and what these results mean for advancing student learning,” Lakota Superintendent Karen Mantia said in a release.

“Our team recognizes that continuing excellence means that we are always improving and always working to bring our students the best teaching to help them succeed in their world.”

According to Cincinnati.com, Lakota is the seventh largest district in Ohio and the biggest in the state to earn the top academic ranking (Excellent with Distinction).

Individually, every school within the district received a rating of Excellent or better.

Schools receiving the Excellent with Distinction rating include Adena Elementary, Freedom Elementary, Heritage Elementary, Hopewell Elementary, Independence Elementary, Lakota Plains Junior, Lakota Ridge Junior, Liberty Junior, Union Elementary and VanGorden Elementary.

Meanwhile, both high schools (Lakota East and Lakota West) and two elementary schools (Cherokee and Woodland) received Excellent ratings.

Overall, the district showed improvement. Seven of the 10 Lakota schools, which received the Excellent with Distinction rating in 2011, had an Excellent rating in 2010. None of the schools in the district fell in rating.

Posted in: Board of Education, News, Schools, Student achievements |

Tags: Tags: Adena Elementary, Cherokee Elementary, Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Freedom Elementary, Heritage Elementary, Hopewell Elementary, Independence Elementary, Lakota, Lakota East, Lakota Plains Junior, Lakota Ridge Junior, Lakota schools, Lakota West, Liberty Junior, school rating, Union Elementary, VanGorden Elemenatry School, Woodland Elementary

The Lakota school district was recently rated “Excellent with Distinction” by the state of Ohio. It was the ninth straight year that Lakota received an “Excellent” rating or better.

“We are thrilled to again earn the state’s highest rating and clearly this is a fantastic reflection on our schools, our students and our community,” stated Superintendent Mike Taylor (photo). “Our community places great pride in being one of the state’s best school districts and we remain a good value for our community.”

In announcing the rating, Taylor pointed out that the district’s financial crisis puts a cloud over continued excellence in Lakota schools.

“I’ve had many parents tell me their concerns about soaring class sizes and loss of programs,” said Taylor.

“The quality of our schools is at risk. We’ve enacted $13 million in deep and district wide cuts and have eliminated more than 50 teaching positions to-date. Without new funding for our schools, we simply cannot maintain the excellence that Lakota families have come to expect.”

Lakota’s other data is as follows: The performance index rose to its highest level of 104.2, and the district met the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) criteria. Additionally, all 26 indicators for student achievement were met. The graduation rate was 93.1% while the attendance rate was 96.2%.

Other local schools recently lost their top ranking. Indian Hill, Kings, Madeira, Mason, Oak Hills, Springboro and Wayne all dropped from “Excellent with Distinction” to “Excellent,” according to the Cincinnati Enquirer.

The Lakota school district has a 10-year, non-continuing, 7.9-mill emergency levy on the November ballot. The levy will cost approximately $242 per year per $100,000 home valuation.

“If this levy doesn’t pass, we will begin dismantling an excellent school system,” Taylor said.

Posted in: Board of Education, Election, Levy news, Schools |

Tags: Tags: Board of Education, Excellent, Excellent with Distinction, Lakota Board of Education, levy, Mike Taylor, school levy