Published: October 30, 2009 05:11 pm      

Moving ahead — 11/02/09

Boyd taking right approach in planning for new high school

Although architects have just started drawing plans for the new Boyd County High School and the building will not be ready for occupancy until at least the 2013-2014 school year, it is clear than school officials already have put much thought into the building and there is much about which to get excited.

The new high school, which will be constructed across Ky. 180 from the current high school, will be divided into “academic clusters,” which educators call “schools within a school.”

Those clusters will include separate areas for science, technology, engineering, agricultural technology, mathematics and medical science; business, information and marketing; communications, arts and humanities; social, entertainment and public services; and a freshmen academy.

We like the idea, particularly the separation of ninth-graders from the rest of the high school. Since the physical and social maturity of ninth-graders can vary greatly, as well as their academic abilities, there are many advantages to keeping this particular class away from the rest of the high school population as much as possible.

The freshman academy will keep ninth-graders together in class and combine them with older students for meals, assemblies and other functions. The separation enhances what Boyd Superintendent Howard K. Osborne called “the three Rs — rigor, relevance and relationships,” that students must build in the first crucial high school year. It also will include literacy programs to ensure that the freshmen are prepared to move up to higher grades, Osborne said.

As far as the separate wings for academic areas is concerned, most high school are designed that way with classrooms of the humanities — English, literature, art and drama, for example — in one area, and math classrooms — algebra, geometry, calculus, etc. — grouped in another area. Of course, high school students take a wide range of classes and would not be confined to one cluster throughout the day, but the concept does separate students into their primary areas of interest.

The new school also will include a 450-seat auditorium. That is something that is missing from too many area high schools, including Paul G. Blazer High School in Ashland. Auditoriums with adequate seating and good acoustics enhance a school’s music and drama programs, and can also be used by speech classes and smaller school assemblies.

Currently, Boyd County High School plays its basketball games at an excellent facility at Boyd County Middle School. However, a 2,500-seat gymnasium planned for the new school will enable the Lions to play their games on the high school campus.

The campus for the new high school is 135 acres. That’s more than enough land for the development of all sorts of areas related to the school.

The new school will be expensive, costing an estimated $31 million, making it by far the costliest school project in the history of this region. That high price tag is one reason why the high school — which has been in the discussion stage for more than a decade — already has not been built.

Funding for the building has been secured, but with so much money being involved, it is critical that it is spent wisely. The school district has implemented a process that will help assure that it gets its money’s worth from this expensive project. A slow, methodical approach that invites input from teachers, parents, students and taxpayers is the surest way of developing a building that will meet the needs of every student.