Some long-awaited changes are in store for the Plymouth-Canton middle school athletic programs, and they could be made even next year.
Boy’s volleyball could be changed to wrestling, and cross country could be added for both boys and girls next year. Both are currently offered as clinics through the school, but are not official school sports.
The changes will be reviewed by the Plymouth-Canton school board in the spring.
Jean Pierre Orlewicz, an 18-year-old Canton High School student, will be sentenced to life in prison on May 12 after being convicted of murder, but his actions will radiate far beyond his jail cell walls. For years to come, the township of Canton will be known as the home of one of the most violent murders the state of Michigan has ever seen.
The drug sweep of the Plymouth Canton Educational Park’s parking lots on October 31, 2007 found alcohol in three students’ cars and an illegal drug in another car. The unannounced search has students debating what rights they have while at school.
A team of Canton Township police officers and canine units inspected all cars on school property. Over 47 cars were searched after dogs gave positive responses, but only four contained drugs or alcohol.
Officials for the Plymouth-Canton Community Schools are pleased with 2007 MEAP results, which were released Tuesday.
Plymouth-Canton students showed improvements in 15 of the 28 categories measured in the 2007 MEAP testing, which tested math, reading, writing, social studies and science in grades 3-9.
In an E-mail read aloud, Williamston resident Jennifer Chisholm expressed her skepticism of the special city council meeting being held the night of, Dec. 19, 2007,
“I am all for new businesses in this town. We need the infrastructure if we are going to remain solvent. However holding a ‘special’ meeting for ONE business that hosted your OWN fundraiser is extremely suspect.”
The Williamston Board of Education will change its long-standing double semester year at Williamston High School to a trimester year starting in the 2008-2009 school year.
The Board said the switch is an effort to better prepare its students and give them a higher quality of education.
Under the current schedule of two semesters a school year, students attend six one-hour long classes a day and receive six credits a year.
The new trimesters will only have five classes a day, but for a longer period of time and students will receive 7.5 credits a year.
Budget cuts for the Plymouth-Canton school district will continue into next year and soon reach the classroom, according to school officials.
Plymouth-Canton Community Schools (PCCS) has cut $11 million over the last five years, and with the lack of aid from the state government, they will be forced to continue cutting expenditures in the next year.
Financial struggles have forced the Plymouth-Canton community school district to raise the costs that students must pay to participate in high school sports.
High school students are now required to pay $180 to play on a varsity sport, an increase of $55 from the 2005-06 school year. To play on a second team, the fee drops to $100, and if the student plays for a third team, it is free of charge.
Michigan’s School of Choice law has aided East Lansing High School’s recent success but is causing problems for neighboring cities.
East Lansing schools offer well a rounded curriculum that includes a good athletic program, comprehensive academics and several extra-curricular activities. Finding education like that has been rarely seen at public schools. This appeal of a better education is drawing students from neighboring cities to transfer from there hometown schools to ELHS. This boost in enrollment is putting ELHS above other local high schools and is boosting its budget as well as many individual awards for students.
The ruling of School of Choice was made by the state of Michigan in 1996, but individual districts have the option on whether to allow out of districts students into their schools. With this rule of open enrollment a student that resides in the Lansing district has the ability to enroll at ELHS. The application is simple a student would just have to indicate name, grade, address, district of residence, and whether there have been suspensions or expulsions.
The City Pulse, a local paper, did an article on September 10, 2003 that researched how local schools were doing since Schools of Choice was enacted by the State Legislation. The 2002-2003 Ingham County School District research in the chart below, shows that the biggest winner is East Lansing and its neighboring city, Lansing, is on the losing side. In the article student Sofia Maystrenko explained how life is since she transferred out of the Lansing School district and is now having much more success at ELHS. She feels that the students at ELHS are more accepting of her and her hobbies and believes that she will have better success at her new school.
With East Lansing leading the pack of students enrolled in their district one can understand why the education infrastructure is doing so well. Good high scoring students who might have gone to a Lansing school are now choosing to attend an East Lansing school. Those students are boosting East Lansing’s credibility and in turn leading more students from other districts to transfer into East Lansing. It’s a cycle that builds up one district but punishes the others.
Last year ELHS was honored with many awards. They have a National Merit semi-finalist. There are many students that have earned Advanced Placement awards. Then at the end of last year ELHS was picked by US News and World Report to receive a Silver Award, marking ELHS as among the top 3 percent of all high schools in the country.
ELHS Principal Paula Steele is very proud of what her teachers and students have
accomplished in the past few years. The school district and the city is being recognized
for their efforts in bettering education.
Current students that live outside the district are the best source to understanding why they chose ELHS. Ben Barkman a senior lives in Lansing but attends ELHS. His reasoning for attending school in East Lansing was that his sister really wanted to go to ELHS so he just followed her but says, “I would have made the same decision all over again because I love ELHS, our sports everything just makes it a great place to go to school.”
Then there is ELHS senior Melissa Johnson. Johnson grew up in East Lansing and lived on Lexington Ave. until 7th grade, where her family decided to move to a country home in Alaidon Township. Johnson and her family had to decide what school district her and her sister would attend. The decision was between East Lansing, Okemos and Mason. The choice was easy for Johnson because Mason was 2.5 miles farther and didn’t have the reputation in academics that ELHS had and Okemos is perceived as not being friendly to out-of-district students. Johnson said she considers herself spoiled because she got to stay at ELHS and receive a great education that she knows has prepared her for college. She adds, “East Lansing has become a part of me and my family.”
On the other side of the story is the Lansing school district which understands it has a problem but has no current solution. Every year the city is losing hundreds of students and millions of dollars because they cannot compete with neighboring, East Lansing when it comes to education. From what students have said, in order for Lansing to compete with East Lansing they might what to integrate specialty classes like foreign languages and AP classes and improve their athletics.
Parents in Lansing Township have a choice when it comes to their children’s education, and some school districts like Waverly Community Schools are benefiting from being one of their options.
According to the Michigan Department of Education website, School of Choice gives students the option to choose where they attend school. Through this state law, families can enroll their students in a school outside of the district in which they reside. Once a student is accepted to a school through school of choice, they can stay in that district until they graduate from high school or decide to leave.
School districts do not have to participate in School of Choice.
