School Boards Aim To Try New Ways Of Dealing With Changing Face Of Missouri’s Schools

The changing faces of our school children seen in pages and pages of numbers and school boards will be looking at them this month with an eye to meeting the needs the numbers describe. The demographics paint a picture of change in our school districts. It used to be that changes int he ethnic makeup of school dsitricts was mostly in metropolitan areas. But no more. The Missouri School Boards Association is holding seminars for school boards this smonth, sharing demographic mnumbers After that, says Association Spokesman Brent Ghan, school boards have to decide what to do with the numbers. He says the numbers show ethnic diversity is spreading to districts throughout the state, challenging those districts to get those students up to federal standards quickly despite their language problems. The numbers also show increasing numbers of students showing up for school without traditional family support and more and more students moving more and more frequently within and among districts. Ghan says the numbers spell “challenge” for school boards and getting the numbers helps the school boards get on with planning.