10 students from Wheeler High School have been named 2022 Georgia Scholars by the state Department of Education.
All six high schools in East Cobb and several students from those schools have been honored by the Georgia Department of Education and state school superintendent Richard Woods.
The state last week released its list of 2022 Advanced Placement Honor Schools, and are broken out in six categories. Kell, Lassiter, Pope, Walton and Wheeler are included in five of those categories, while Sprayberry is named in four categories.
Kell, Lassiter, Pope, Walton and Wheeler are named among the AP Schools of Distinction, which have at least 20 percent of students taking AP exams and have at least 50 percent earning a score of 3 or higher.
Kell, Lassiter, Pope, Sprayberry, Walton and Wheeler were named AP Humanities Schools (at least five students testing in an ELA course, two history/social science courses, one fine arts course and one world language course).
All six East Cobb high schools also were named AP Humanities Achievement Schools, including the description above and having with least 50% of all AP Humanities exams earning scores of 3 or higher.
Kell, Lassiter, Pope, Walton and Wheeler are AP STEM Schools, having at least five students testing in at least four AP STEM courses.
Those five also are AP STEM Achievement Schools (description above, and at least 50 percent of all AP STEM exams earning scores of 3 or higher).
In addition, Sprayberry was designated among the AP Access and Support Schools, which have at least 30 percent of AP exams taken by students who are African-American and/or Hispanic and 30 percent of all AP exams earning scores of 3 or higher.
The Georgia Department of Education also has named its 2022 class of Georgia Scholars. They excel in the classroom, participate in athletics and/or other extracurricular activities and take part in leadership opportunities.
The Cobb school district has 23 students named Georgia Scholars, including 10 from Wheeler High School. Here are the students named from East Cobb schools:
Pope: Christine Werts
Sprayberry: Riley Smith, Hannah Fischer, Jeremy Thomas, Kelynn Johnson
Walton: Kunling Tong, Shruthi Maharajan, Isabel Buyers, Alexa Weston, Fiona Guo, Joseph Walter
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The Cobb County School District is continuing online registration for kindergarten and first grade for the 2022-23 school year.
There’s a special link to sign up for students who are new to the district. For parents who already have a child in the district, they can use their ParentVue accountto register additional new students.
The parents of new students must provide the following information:
Proof of residency: Home ownership documentation or lease/rental agreement; and current utility monthly statement;
Certificate of Immunization (Form #3231): Available from a Georgia physician or the Cobb and Douglas Public Health Department;
Certificate of Vision, Hearing, Dental, and Nutritional Screening Form 3300B:Available from a Georgia physician or the Cobb and Douglas Public Health Department and must be dated within 12 months of the first day of school;
Proof of Birth Date: The school will accept one of the following documents: a certified copy of Birth Certificate, Military ID, Passport, Adoption Record, a religious record authorized by a religious official, an official school transcript, or an affidavit of age;
Social Security Card or CCSD waiver Form JBC-4: The state will require the social security number for students applying for the HOPE scholarship.
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The Cobb County School District will be paying a $2,000 bonus to all permanent full-time and part-time employees at the end of April.
Superintendent Chris Ragsdale announced the bonuses at Thursday’s Cobb Board of Education meeting and said the funding comes from the district’s allotment of federal CARES Act money.
Permanent employees include teachers and administrators, paraprofessionals and other staffers who are not hired on a seasonal basis.
The state of Georgia previously said it would be giving similar bonuses to bus drivers, custodians, and cafeteria workers.
The Cobb school district did not indicate in a release issued after the meeting the total cost of the bonuses.
The Cobb school district has given two retention bonuses to school bus drivers and monitors during the current school year to help prevent staff shortages.
The district’s website has nearly 200 open positions posted. The Cobb school district has nearly 18,000 employees and is the largest employer in Cobb County.
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Thomas Flugum, at left, attending the ribbon-cutting for the new Pope High School gymnasium in 2018.
The Cobb County School District announced Thursday that Dr. Thomas Flugum is retiring as the principal of Pope High School.
The news was announced after the Cobb Board of Education held an executive session where personnel matters are discussed.
Flugum’s retirement is effective June 1, according to Keeli Bowen, the Cobb school district’s chief human resources officer. His replacement has not been named, but new principal appointments are typically made in the spring for the following school year.
Flugum has been the principal at Pope since 2017, after arriving at the East Cobb high school in 2010 as a teacher and coach and later serving as an assistant principal.
He is a former Army officer and Cobb police officer who became a teacher and coach at a number of Cobb high schools. He was an assistant football coach at Sprayberry and Lassiter and was head football coach at Wheeler.
In October 2020, Flugum was charged with DUI in Woodstock in a case that is still pending in the Cherokee County court system.
Last year, he and Cobb school district officials came under fire from local Jewish groups after swastika graffiti was found in a boys bathroom at Pope. Flugum’s letter to the school community did not specify that it was an anti-Semitic incident; Rabbi Larry Sernovitz of Temple Kol Emeth later spoke to students on the campus.
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Walton High School tennis courts will be built on Providence Road, next to a new baseball stadium.
The Cobb Board of Education on Thursday approved construction projects for a replacement building for Eastvalley Elementary School and a sports complex near Walton High School.
The contracts recommended by Cobb County School District passed by 7-0 votes. The Eastvalley replacement facility will cost $36.7 million and the campus will be relocated to the former East Cobb Middle School site on Holt Road.
The Walton sports complex costs $6.738 million and will house the school’s baseball and tennis teams.
During a board work session Thursday afternoon, district officials said the Walton complex will have access points on Providence Road and Pine Road and will have 80 parking spaces.
The Walton complex has been delayed several months after residents in the nearby Independence Square subdivision expressed concerns about the baseball bleachers and public address system being located near their homes.
Jennifer Sunderland, who went public with those concerns, told East Cobb News on Wednesday that they have been addressed, “and we are pleased with the new design which moved home plate and concessions so they are not directly behind neighborhood homes.”
Superintendent Chris Ragsdale said at the work session that the configuration of the baseball field has been switched 180 degrees, with the outfield fencing being located closest to the homes.
Board member David Banks said he has safety issues about students using a crosswalk at Bill Murdock Road and Pine, which is a three-way stop.
He told by staff that the district is discussing the possibility of having a traffic signal at that location.
The Walton complex is expected to be completed by the end of the year, while the new Eastvalley campus is slated to open for the 2023-24 academic year.
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The long-awaited rebuild of Eastvalley Elementary School could be a major step closer to fruition this week.
The Cobb Board of Education will be asked on Thursday to approve a $36.7 million contract for R.K. Redding Construction, Inc., of Bremen to replace the aging facility on Lower Roswell Road and relocate the school to the former East Cobb Middle School campus on Holt Road.
As we noted last October, the Cobb County School District released renderings of the new campus, which will include 136,110 square feet and 61 classrooms.
According to an agenda item for Thursday’s meetings, construction is expected to be completed by May 2023 and open to students for the 2023-24 academic year.
Eastvalley parents have been pressing the district about overcrowded conditions for years at the school, which was built in the early 1960s to hold around 400 students.
This year Eastvalley has more than 700 students and more than a dozen trailers, whose conditions have been called “deplorable.”
Funding would come from the current Cobb Ed-SPLOST V, as would a new sports complex for Walton High School.
The district also will be asking the school board on Thursday to approve a $6.738 million contract for Bowen and Watson, Inc. of Toccoa to construct a new baseball field and tennis courts on nearly 20 acres at Providence Road and Pine Road.
The agenda item doesn’t include a site plan or provide any details of what has changed. In response to a request from East Cobb News seeking more information, a district spokeswoman issued the following statement:
“Superintendent Ragsdale has very clear on this project as he is on all new construction: hear from the community before shovels hit the ground. All available details will be presented to the Board on Thursday and we are confident this is the best design for Walton and the surrounding community.”
The Cobb school board spent $5.65 million to acquire property for the complex, which was planned after several sports teams were relocated due the construction of the new Walton classroom building that opened in 2017.
The Walton softball and tennis teams have been playing home competitions at Terrell Mill Park since 2014.
The softball team has since moved back to the former site of the baseball team, which is playing home games this season at the East Cobb Baseball complex near Kell High School.
Construction of the Walton sports complex is expected to be completed by December.
The Cobb school board also will be asked Thursday to hire an interim law firm.
The board last year hired Atlanta-based Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough as it faced a special review from its accrediting agency.
But according to an agenda item, the Nelson Mullins legal team that has been serving the Cobb school district has left for Parker Poe Adams & Bernstein, a Southern regional law firm with locations in eight cities, including Atlanta.
The district is asking the board to hire Parker Poe Adams starting April 1 and under the same agreement as it has had with Nelson Mullins.
The board is meeting in public at a 1 p.m. work session Thursday and a 7 p.m. business session at the Cobb County School District Central Office (514 Glover St., Marietta).
The agendas for both meetings can be found here; an executive session will take place in between.
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The Cobb Board of Education member who has represented the Walton and Wheeler high school clusters since 2019 is not seeking re-election this year.
Charisse Davis
Democrat Charisse Davis, who ousted then-incumbent Republican Scott Sweeney in 2018 in Post 6, did not qualify last week for the newly redrawn seat that takes out East Cobb.
The Georgia legislature approved maps submitted by Cobb Republicans over the objections of their county Democratic colleagues.
In a message she posted Tuesday on her Facebook page, Davis explained that redistricting has moved the Walton and Wheeler areas to Post 5, represented by Republican vice chairman David Banks.
Davis, a former elementary school teacher and currently a youth services librarian in Fulton County, still lives in the new Post 6.
Davis didn’t indicate in her message why she decided not to run again. East Cobb News has left a message seeking comment, but she encouraged voters to support three candidates in particular, all Democrats.
“It has been an honor serving the students of this district, and I look forward to continuing my career in education and supporting other educators who have answered the call to run for school board: Becky Sayler, Post 2; Dr. Catherine Pozniak, Post 4; and Nichelle Davis, Post 6.
“Continue to support our CCSD schools, hold the board accountable, and vote!”
Nichelle Davis is the only candidate who qualified in Post 6, which includes the Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings area.
Sayler is one of two Democrats vying in the May 24 primary in Post 2, which includes Smyrna and some of South Cobb. Post 2 first-term Democratic incumbent Jaha Howard, who also was drawn into Post 6, is running for Georgia school superintendent.
Post 4 includes the Kell and Sprayberry and some of the Lassiter clusters. Pozniak, also a Democrat, is a Sprayberry graduate who will be challenging three-term Republican incumbent David Chastain in November.
The current Cobb school board has a 4-3 Republican majority, and for the last three years has wrangled along partisan lines on a number of contentious issues.
Howard and Davis have been at the center of those arguments, particularly over the Cobb school district’s senior tax exemption, equity and racial issues and the district’s response to COVID-19.
Davis also signed a petition started in 2020 to advocate changing the name of Wheeler High School, named after a Confederate Civil War general and which opened in 1965, as Cobb schools were preparing to integrate.
Davis and Howard also sparked a special review by the Cobb school district’s accrediting agency last year after complaining that the GOP majority was silencing them.
Before the current school board maps were redrawn, Republican Amy Henry, a parent of four students in the Walton cluster, announced her intent to run for Post 6.
Voters in the East Cobb area of what has been Post 6 will next get to vote for Cobb school board representation in 2024, when Banks’ term expires.
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Cobb is a school district “with a great track record,” Cognia CEO Mark Elgart told school board members. “But you have challenges in how you govern.”
The accrediting agency for the Cobb County School District is overturning most of its findings in a report it issued last fall following a special review of the district.
The Cobb school district was facing a December deadline to make four required improvements or possibly have its accreditation status reconsidered, but that’s no longer the case.
The head of Cognia, an Alpharetta-based education accreditor, told Cobb Board of Education members Monday at a special-called meeting that it was no longer requiring two of those areas to be addressed.
They include polices for procurement and communications with board members.
The two other areas, relating to board governance, will be evaluated when the Cobb school district will undergo a previously scheduled accreditation review in 2024.
(You can read through the initial Cognia report and accompanying documents here, here and here.)
Dr. Mark Elgart, the Cognia chief executive officer, said Monday that Cobb’s accreditation was never in doubt, and said a letter he sent to Superintendent Chris Ragsdale March 3 was replacing the report of the special review.
The Cognia letter comes as the Cobb school district has been considering switching accrediting agencies, and as legislation is being considered that would remove school board relations from the purview of accreditors.
In his letter, Elgart reassured Cobb school officials that the issues cited in the Cognia special review did not affect what’s happening in district classrooms.
“At no time during the recent process did the teaching, learning, or professional leadership within the system place its accreditation at risk,” he wrote. “The focus of recent engagements with the system has and continues to be on helping the school district improve, and specifically within the area of board governance.”
Cognia conducted the review after the board’s three Democratic members and nearly 50 community members made complaints on a variety of issues.
“This is an engagement about improvement,” Elgart said during the Monday meeting, during which he presented and explained his letter.
Monday was the first time that Ragsdale and the board’s Republican majority have addressed the Cognia report in public.
But board members didn’t discuss the letter or ask questions, and Ragsdale gave only brief explanatory remarks during the 20-minute meeting (you can watch a replay here).
After the meeting was adjourned, the district immediately issued a press release and a copy of the letter.
School districts can ask for a review of Cognia findings if they can determine that they are based on information that is not factually accurate or is misinterpreted.
Ragsdale said the district chose to challenge findings that he said were “inconsistent with evidence” the Cobb school district brought to Cognia’s attention.
In the letter, Elgart acknowledged Cognia’s special review team “did not adequately contextualize or incorporate factual evidence provided by the School District, drawing erroneous conclusions.”
Those teams, he added are “expected to place a higher weight on physical evidence than assertions of opinion or allegations.”
He didn’t explain what that evidence was, but in his remarks to the school board Elgart said that “there was no real issue” with the procurement policies of the Cobb school district.
Some board members and members of the public have complained about how Cobb schools have spent COVID-related federal CARES funding, including purchases of special UV lights and sanitizing machines.
“People may disagree” with how the money is spent,” Elgart said, “but that’s not evidence that the policies weren’t followed.”
He also said that the Cognia special review team erroneously concluded that school board members weren’t being properly provided information by district officials before being asked to vote.
“Additionally, the evidence indicates that the superintendent authorizes and encourages board members to contact members of the executive cabinet directly if they have questions regarding policies, procedures, or operations within those administrators’ areas of responsibility,” Elgart wrote in his letter.
“It is not common practice for superintendents to provide board members this level of direct access and information. This level of access is to be commended. This practice is factually inconsistent with any suggestion that information is withheld from board members.”
But he said the Cognia special review findings of board relations and governance remain valid.
“The evidence remains that this is a divided school board,” Elgar told the board members. “That is something that is contained within the walls of this room, and that is good.”
While he said those problems haven’t spilled over into the academic environment, he said that board members often vote in “blocks”—mostly along party lines—and that’s “a concerning pattern.”
Cognia is requiring that the Cobb school board adhere to policies to “develop a culture of trust” as well as create a plan of accountability for its code of ethics.
“We’re not telling you how to do this,” Elgart said. “We’re telling you that if you do this you will be a better board.”
He concluded by saying that while Cobb is a school district with “a great track record . . . the challenge is how you govern.”
The Cobb school district’s release included a statement from board chairman David Chastain saying that “based on Dr. Elgart’s presentation, the Board is happy to hear Cognia’s review of the Special Review contained inaccuracies which have now been corrected in the letter provided to the District and the Board. Our Superintendent, staff, and families can now fully return their focus on students and schools.”
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The Cobb Board of Education will hold a special-called meeting Monday to hear from Superintendent Chris Ragsdale about a recent “communication” from its accrediting agency “regarding accreditation status.”
That’s according to a special notice issued Friday by the Cobb County School District. The meeting will take place at 12:30 p.m. Monday in the board meeting room at the CCSD central office (514 Glover St., Marietta).
The district indicated the meeting also will be live-streamed at this link, as well as shown on Comcast Cable Channel 24 and Charter Cable Channel 182).
There’s no other information about the specifics of district’s communication with Cognia, an Alpharetta-based education accreditor that conducted a special review of the Cobb school district in 2021.
In releasing its report in November, Cogniadetailed what it called a “Progress Monitoring Review” that includes improvements the district must make in four areas: effective policy-making from the school board, board members adhering to a code of ethics, educational equity and financial accountability.
(You can read through the Cognia report and accompanying documents here, here and here.)
The district has until the end of the year to make those improvements before Cognia would consider whether to retain full accreditation status for Cobb schools.
In 2019, Cognia reaccredited the Cobb County School District—the second-largest in Georgia, with more than 107,000 students—through 2024.
But last March, Democratic board members Charisse Davis, Jaha Howard and Tre’ Hutchins went to Cognia after saying they were being ignored by the board’s Republican majority and Ragsdale to discuss early literacy, educator and employee support and board governance training topics.
Since the Cognia report was released, neither the school board nor Ragsdale have discussed the findings in public.
The Democratic members have tried to get the report put on school board meeting agendas, but have not gotten a majority vote.
Some citizens speaking out at public comment periods of school board members have demanded that the district discuss the Cognia report.
The Cobb school district is considering switching accrediting agencies. The Georgia Accrediting Commission, which accredits individual schools and not school districts, has visited high schools in the Cobb school district in recent weeks.
Cobb school district officials chafed at Cognia’s special review process, saying the agency refused to specify the allegations that prompted the review.
Randy Scamihorn, the Cobb school board chairman in 2021, said when the Cognia report was released that “while I am pleased this review is unlikely to have an immediately negative effect on the District’s students, it did serve as a significant distraction for the staff.”
Public complaints to Cognia cited financial concerns, the district’s handling of COVID-19 matters and even the board’s refusal to consider requests to rename Wheeler High School.
Cobb district officials have cited a loss of accreditation in Clayton and DeKalb public schools in 2008 and 2011 respectively for their concerns about Cognia’s special review.
State Sen. Lindsey Tippins, a West Cobb Republican and former Cobb school board member, has proposed legislation that would restrict the scope of accrediting agencies.
His bill, SB 498, would remove school board relations from the purview of accreditors and would give accreditation authority for elementary and middle schools solely to the Georgia Department of Education.
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Catherine Pozniak, a Sprayberry High School graduate who’s been a teacher and state education administrator, has announced her campaign for Post 4 on the Cobb Board of Education.
Post 4 includes the Sprayberry and Kell and part of the Lassiter High School clusters in a seat that’s been redrawn for the 2022 elections.
The seat is held by third-term Republican David Chastain, currently the Cobb school board chairman.
Earlier this week Pozniak declared her intent to run in the May 24 primary as a Democrat.
Pozniak, who graduated from Sprayberry in 1997, also attended Kincaid Elementary School and Daniell Middle School.
She said she’s running because the current Cobb school board hasn’t done much planning to help students recover from disruptions caused by COVID-19 closures, including use of more than $250 million in federal relief aid to help students.
She said “it’s been disappointing to see partisanship from our Board’s leaders when our schools need their support the most.
“The Board hasn’t even laid out goals since 2018, before the pandemic,” Pozniak said. “So of course there isn’t a plan for any of this.”
Republicans currently hold a 4-3 edge on the Cobb school board. Chastain, who has indicated he will be seeking a fourth term, is the only GOP member up for re-election this year.
Pozniak earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Sydney in Australia, a master’s degree from the University of Cambridge, and a doctorate in educational leadership from Harvard University.
She taught in a school on a Lakota reservation in South Dakota and was an assistant state superintendent of education for fiscal operations in Louisiana and the head of an educational non-profit in Baton Rouge, La.
Pozniak currently is principal at Watershed Advisors, an educational and workforce consultancy started by the former Louisiana school superintendent.
Tammy Andress, a former Lassiter PTSA co-president who ran for Post 5 on the Cobb school board in 2020, said Thursday on her former campaign page that she was considering a run for Post 4 this year following redistricting.
But Andress, a Democrat, said she’s supporting Pozniak, whom she said has a “wealth of experience, knowledge, passion, empathy and determination she would bring to our School Board. She’s the real deal!!!”
Austin Heller, a Kennesaw State University student, previously announced his campaign as a Democrat for Post 4, but was drawn out in reapportionment.
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The Cobb County School District said Thursday that 98 percent of current employees in “full-time contracted, certificated” job categories have returned job offers for the 2022-23 academic year.
In a release, the district said that more than 8,000 contracts were sent out to those employees, including teachers, counselors, psychologists, administrators and district-level employees requiring certification.
The district did not break down those numbers by job categories.
The next academic and fiscal year in Cobb schools goes from July 1, 2022 through June 30, 2023.
“Our District has some of the smallest turnover of any big district in the country, which, after the last couple years we have been through, is really impressive to see,” Cobb Board of Education chairman David Chastain said in the release.
The district has struggled to fill some positions in other job classifications, especially in staff support positions, such as bus drivers and substitute teachers.
In the current school year, Cobb has twice distributed bonus money to some of what it calls classified employees, including bus drivers and monitors, to improve retention rates.
The district said it is continuing to hire certified, administrative and classified positions for the coming school year, and lists vacancies here.
There also will be a virtual K-12 teacher job fair March 29-31, 2022. More information can be found by clicking here; participants must fill out a formal job application beforehand.
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Democrats Charisse Davis of the Cobb school board and Jerica Richardson of the Cobb commission have had the East Cobb portions of their districts removed.
Two first-term Democrats who represent part of East Cobb on the Cobb Board of Commissioners and the Cobb Board of Education will have different electoral boundaries soon.
The Georgia Senate finalized redistricting bills for both bodies on Wednesday, clearing the way for Gov. Brian Kemp’s signature into law.
The bills were sponsored by Cobb Republicans over the objections of the county’s Democratic-led legislative delegation, and easily passed in the legislature, which has strong GOP majorities.
For a larger view of the new Cobb commissioners map, click here.
Jerica Richardson, who was elected to commission District 2 in 2020, was drawn out of her district in a map that for the next decade will place most of East Cobb in District 3 (in gold on the map at right).
District 2 has included the Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings area and part of East Cobb. Richardson moved into a new home off Post Oak Tritt Road last year, but will have to move again by the end of the year if she seeks a second term in 2024.
The new District 2 (in pink) will include Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings, some of Marietta and other areas along the I-75 corridor.
The bill’s main sponsor, Republican John Carson of Northeast Cobb, has said that his map will likely keep the commission’s current 3-2 Democratic majority.
But Richardson and other Cobb Democrats have been vocal at Georgia Capitol press conferences in opposing the GOP maps.
“This bill essentially overwrites the vote you made 2 years ago and creates a new map that doesn’t take the community’s input into consideration,” Richardson said on her Facebook page Thursday.
“This is a dangerous precedent, and I plan to continue making my voice heard in order to support this community and its needs.”
District 3 commissioner JoAnn Birrell, a Republican, is nearing the end of her third term this year.
Charisse Davis, who has represented the Walton and Wheeler clusters on the Cobb school board since 2019, also was drawn into a new post that no longer includes East Cobb.
She lives in the Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings area, which forms the heart of the new Post 6. Davis is up for re-election but has not announced whether she’s seeking re-election.
For a larger view of the new Cobb school board post map, click here.
East Cobb News has left a message with Davis seeking comment.
She noted on her Facebook page recently that the Cobb GOP maps affecting her, Richardson and current 6th District U.S. Rep. Lucy McBath are “ensuring that the east Cobb area will no longer have representation from any of the Black women whose districts currently include east Cobb.”
While East Cobb has been solid terrain for Republicans, Democrats have been making gains in recent elections as the once-conservative county undergoes significant demographic and political change.
Only on the Cobb school board do Republicans have a local majority.
For the last three years, the school board has held a 4-3 GOP edge (after Republicans previously enjoyed a 6-1 advantage), and has been roiled controversies that generally have fallen along partisan lines.
The shifting lines for the school board also reduce East Cobb representation to two members. They are current chairman David Chastain, a Republican who has said he will be seeking another term in 2022 for Post 4, and David Banks, the GOP vice chairman whose Post 5 will now cover most of the Walton and Wheeler areas.
Davis and fellow first-term Democrat Jaha Howard, also of the Smyrna area, have been in the middle of disputes over the senior tax exemption, equity issues, student discipline matters and the Cobb County School District’s COVID-19 response.
The new maps put Davis and Howard, currently of Post 2, together. But he has announced he is running for Georgia School Superintendent this year.
(PLEASE NOTE: The process of redistricting elected school board posts has nothing to do with the boundaries of school attendance zones, which are drawn by school district administrative staff and are done mainly to balance out school capacity.)
McBath, completing her second term, has switched to the 7th district, which includes most of Democratic-leaning Gwinnett County after the legislature redrew the 6th to create a GOP-friendly seat that includes East Cobb, North Fulton, part of Forsyth County and Dawson County.
Part of East Cobb also is included in newly redrawn 11th District, which is represented by Republican Barry Lowdermilk.
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The Cobb County School District will hold a resource fair for students with disabilities and their parents on March 8 at North Cobb High School.
The event will provide information about summer camps, ballet, swimming, sports, theatres, museums and other extracurricular opportunities.
The fair, which last was held in March 2020, right before the COVID-19 pandemic was declared, takes place from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. on March 8 and reservations to attend can be made by clicking here.
More than 50 vendors will be on hand to provide information about sensory-friendly and accessible options.
They include the Alliance Theatre, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, Children’s Museum of Atlanta, Cobb Aquatics, Cobb County Public Library System, Cobb PARKS Cultural Arts, Girl Scouts, High Museum of Art, Rockstar Cheer, Six Flags Over Georgia, Tellus Science Museum and Zoo Atlanta.
“We are so excited to offer this fair as an in-person event again – it gives our families the opportunity to interact with representatives who can directly share their accessibility and sensory-friendly offerings! We have new participants joining this year along with the former,” said Dominique Terens, Cobb Schools Special Education Compliance Supervisor, in a release issued by the district.
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Rainey Sharrow, a Walton student, and her mother, Susan Sharrow, a Pope media specialist, volunteering at the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl at Mt. Bethel Elementary School. Photo: Cobb County School District
After being cancelled in 2021 due to COVID-19, students from the Cobb County School District gathered in hybrid fashion in January to compete in the Helen Ruffin Reading Bowl.
It’s a multi-stage, quiz-style competition started in 1986 by a former DeKalb County educator to encourage students to master reading skills.
After an initial competition that drew 37 teams in virtual format, Cobb students came to Mt. Bethel Elementary School in East Cobb in January in a face-to-face stage.
Among the volunteers was Pope High School media specialist Susan Sharrow, and her daughter Rainey, a senior at Walton High School.
“The talent our students have is remarkable, and I love witnessing their nerves turn to calm as they confidently buzz in and answer questions about the books,” Susan Sherrow said in a release issued by the Cobb County School District.
Six Cobb teams advanced to the West Regional competition, and Cobb teams swept first place titles in all grade levels.
Representing the Cobb school district at the virtual state competition in March are students from Kemp Elementary School, Campbell Middle School and South Cobb High School.
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The proposed Cobb Board of Education map passed by the House would remove Post 6 from East Cobb. For a larger version click here.
Mostly along party lines, the Georgia House on Monday approved Republican-sponsored bills redistricting seats on the Cobb Board of Education and the Cobb Board of Commissioners.
They now will be considered by the Senate.
The bills drew opposition from members of the Democratic majority in the Cobb legislative delegation, who accused their GOP colleagues of skirting local courtesies during reapportionment.
The House also voted 95-64 to approve a commission map drawn by GOP State Rep. John Carson of Northeast Cobb that he said would likely still maintain the current 3-2 Democratic majority.
But Democratic lawmakers objected to redrawing current Democratic District 2 Commissioner Jerica Richardson and District 3 Republican Commissioner JoAnn Birrell into the same East Cobb-based district.
Birrell and Keli Gambrill, the other GOP commissioner from District 1 in North Cobb, are both up for re-election this year.
If the commission map is approved, Richardson would have to move inside the boundaries of the new District 2 if she runs for a second term in 2024.
Although redistricting bills must be passed by the entire legislature, local delegations typically move maps forward for full House and Senate votes.
Most of East Cobb would be drawn into District 3 on the Cobb Board of Commissioners in a map approved by the Georgia House.
But in the last election cycle, Democrats became the majority on the Cobb commission, which previously had a 4-1 Republican majority.
Republicans hold a 4-3 edge on an increasingly fractious Cobb school board, with a mostly partisan split on a number of issues.
The GOP map would move Post 6—the Walton and Wheeler clusters currently represented by Democrat Charisse Davis—into the Smyrna-Vinings area.
The Walton, Wheeler and Pope clusters would be included in a new Post 5, where four-term Republican David Banks is the incumbent.
The Sprayberry, Lassiter and Kell clusters would be reformed into Post 4, whose current member is Republican David Chastain.
Chastain has indicated he will be seeking a fourth term this year. Davis, in her first term, has not said whether she’s running again in 2022.
(PLEASE NOTE: The process of redistricting elected school board posts has nothing to do with the boundaries of school attendance zones, which are drawn by school district administrative staff.)
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In a partisan vote, the Cobb Board of Education on Thursday approved an extension of Superintendent Chris Ragsdale’s contract another year to February 2025.
Without any discussion, the board’s four Republicans voted in favor of the extension, while the three Democrats voted against.
Ragsdale, whose contract was amended by the GOP majority in November, is receiving a base salary of $350,000 in a current contract that was to run through Feb. 10, 2024.
Any changes in the financial terms or other portions of Ragsdale’s contract were not announced at the Thursday night board business meeting.
The meeting was not available on the district’s live-streaming link or on its Comcast cable channel due to what a district spokeswoman said were technical difficulties.
She said the meeting was being recorded and would be posted on the district’s website. Board member Jaha Howard, who was participating in the meeting remotely, recorded the meeting and streamed it on his Facebook page.
The extension vote took place as the board was acting on items discussed during an executive session on Thursday afternoon.
In making his monthly remarks after the vote, Ragsdale said that “I appreciate the vote of confidence” and “look forward to serving this board and district.”
In recent years the board has typically extended the superintendent’s contract during February, and for the most part it has been uneventful.
But in 2021 the Democratic minority voted against an extension for Ragsdale, who has been superintendent since 2015.
In November, the four Republicans voted for an amended contract that gave him increased flexibility in setting the terms for any eventual departure.
He could leave his position with full pay if a special panel determines he’s been “harassed” or “embarrassed” by school board members and he would receive 90 days advance notice from the board if he is to be terminated without cause.
The contract revisions were also made as the Cobb school district received the report of a special review by its accrediting agency that outlined a plan for improvement focusing largely on fractured board relations and governance issues.
That review was sparked in part by the three board Democrats and members of the public.
Under other financial terms of his existing contract, Ragsdale gets 25 days of paid vacation per year and an automobile allowance of $1,200 a month. The board makes contributions to his retirement, Social Security, Medicare and a tax-sheltered annuity plan, and provides health insurance for him and his family.
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The Cobb County School District announced Tuesday that school bus drivers and monitors received another $1,200 retention bonus in their December paychecks.
The district distributed bonuses for drivers and monitors in May, and in a release said that new employees in those positions who have been hired by Feb. 28 will receive a $1,000 bonus.
“Our bus drivers and monitors are the reason 70% of our students make it to school every day,” Cobb school district Chief Operations Officer Marc Smith said in the release.
“They are valuable members of our Cobb Schools team, and we want to make sure we keep them on our team. At the same time, we also have the opportunity to hire new safety-minded professionals.”
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An employee at Blackwell Elementary School in Northeast Cobb has been charged with eavesdropping and cruelty to children after Cobb Police said a student saw a surveillance camera in a boys bathroom this week and reported it to a teacher.
A warrant taken out on Friday against Justin Julian, 37, of Acworth, shows that he has been charged with three counts of unlawful surveillance and one count of first degree child cruelty—all felonies—after separate alleged incidents at the Canton Road school on Wednesday.
He was taken into custody on Friday and was released from the Cobb County Adult Detention Center Saturday on a $15,000 bond, according to Cobb Sheriff’s Office records.
The warrant alleges that Julian placed a camera in a boys bathroom and on Wednesday afternoon observed a 10-year-old boy using the urinal. According to the warrant, the boy saw the camera “and was distraught and notified a school teacher.”
The warrant also alleges that Julian watched an 8-year-old boy and another 10-year-old boy use the urinal via a bathroom camera during the same time period.
Neither the warrant nor a message that went out to the Blackwell community specified Julian’s job at the school.
The Blackwell message said that school officials reported the allegations “to the local authorities and worked closely with them throughout the investigation.”
The staff member, the Blackwell message said, “is no longer allowed in our school building.”
The warrant states that Julian was required to wear an ankle monitor before he was released and he is not allowed to have contract with children 16 or under, or linger anywhere children of that age range are present.
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The Cobb school board’s Republican majority is recommending a map that would leave East Cobb with two seats. For a larger view click here.
Republican members of the Cobb legislative delegation have filed a bill that would redistrict Cobb Board of Education posts along similar lines recommended recently by the school board’s GOP majority.
State Rep. Ginny Ehrhart of West Cobb filed HB 1028 on Wednesday (you can read it here) as the Cobb legislative delegation—which has a one-member Democratic majority—was meeting over reapportionment.
Co-sponsors of the bill include East Cobb Republicans John Carson, Matt Dollar and Don Parsons.
The delegation is carving out Cobb commission and school board lines for the next decade following the 2020 Census.
The local reapportionment process is usually completed within a county’s delegation before being submitted as a bill that must pass the full legislature, typically in consent fashion on what’s called a local calendar.
Instead, Ehrhart’s legislation will start in the House, after getting a first reading and committee assignment next week.
(PLEASE NOTE: The process of redistricting elected school board posts has nothing to do with the boundaries of school attendance zones, which are drawn by school district administrative staff and are done mainly to balance out school capacity.)
For the last three years, the Cobb school board has held a 4-3 Republican majority (after the GOP previously enjoyed a 6-1 advantage), and has been roiled in a number of controversies that generally have fallen along partisan lines.
State Rep. Erick Allen, a Smyrna Democrat and the Cobb delegation chairman, proposed a draft map of Cobb school board posts earlier this month that would make few changes to the current lines.
The four Republicans on the Cobb school board approved a map designed to maintain their majority. The map would take out most of the East Cobb portion of Post 6 that currently includes the Walton and Wheeler high school clusters.
That seat is currently held by first-term Democrat Charisse Davis, who under the GOP map would be drawn in the same post as Jaha Howard, another first-term Democrat who represents Post 2 in the Smyrna area.
The school board’s recommendation is advisory, but Ehrhart’s bill follows similar lines.
Post 6 would be centered in the Smyrna-Vinings area, keeping several precincts in the Powers Ferry and Terrell Mill corridors.
The Walton-Wheeler zones would mostly be shifted to Post 5, which covers the Lassiter and Pope attendance zones.
That seat is held by Republican vice chairman David Banks.
The new lines, however they might be drawn, will take effect for 2022 elections that include three school board seats.
They are Post 2 (Howard has declared his intent to run for state school superintendent); Post 6 (Davis has not announced her plans) and Post 4 in Northeast Cobb (incumbent David Chastain has said he will be seeking another term).
The Cobb delegation also will be redrawing the four district lines for the Cobb Board of Commissioners.
On Tuesday, the commission’s three Democrats voted in favor of a map drawn by Allen that makes minimal changes to the current lines.
But the two Republicans, JoAnn Birrell of Northeast Cobb and Keli Gambrill of North Cobb, voted against that map.
They are both up for re-election this year. Birrell said she does not support the proposed map because it has taken out some of her East Cobb precincts.
Like the school board’s map, the commissioners’ action is “more of an endorsement vote,” deputy county manager Jimmy Gisi said during the Tuesday meeting.
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The Cobb County School District resumed public reporting of new COVID-19 cases this week after not doing so to start the spring semester.
But changes are underway to alter the present reporting system, and in Friday’s update only the district-wide total number of cases—1,856— were disclosed in its weekly notification report.
That’s for the past week, Jan. 14-21, and is a single-week high during the current school year.
The totals no longer include a school-by-school breakdown, as has been done for most of the past two years.
There also was no information provided on COVID case numbers reported before that. The spring semester in Cobb began on Jan. 5.
Until Friday, district’s notification report page had not been updated since Dec. 17, 2021, the last day of the fall semester.
At the time, there were 6,709 cumulative cases reported among students and staff since July 1, 2021.
Superintendent Chris Ragsdale said Thursday night that as the Omicron variant subsides, reporting those figures will be done differently.
“Most organizations have encouraged case counts not be the primary emphasis,” said Ragsdale, reading from prepared remarks, and citing the CDC and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the White House COVID-19 adviser.
“We are taking the guidance to not focus on case counts,” Ragsdale said. Changing school district protocols is a “multi-step process that will result in no numbers being seen on a web page after the Omicron variant goes through. We will still report, as required, to DPH.”
On Jan. 6. Ragsdale said the district was changing some COVID protocols, including eliminating most contract-tracing, after a new state public health order was issued for schools.
On Thursday, Ragsdale later discussed mental health issues affecting youth, as well as learning loss caused by COVID-19 disruptions, saying some mitigation efforts have been “damaging to students.”
“The bottom line is that we are having school,” he said, “and we are trying to get back to normal as quickly as possible. Because we know a normal school day for our students is what’s going to benefit them most.”
He added that parents should keep their kids home if they are sick, but “otherwise, they need to be in school, where teaching and learning are going to be going on every day.”
Board memberJaha Howard tried to question Ragsdale at that point, but chairman David Chastain told him that “if you have any questions, you can call the superintendent. We’re going to move forward with the agenda.”
Howard voted against adopting the Thursday night business meeting agenda at a Thursday afternoon work session because it contained no specific COVID-related items.
The superintendent made the COVID remarks during dedicated time for him to speak on a variety topics and that typically aren’t published on the agenda.
Howard has attempted to question Ragsdale at previous board meetings about COVID and other issues, without much success.
After a brief interchange with Howard, Chastain repeated his comments, and the board began acting on other agenda items.
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