Board to set priorities for elem. schools

VERONA —  Augusta County School Board members say while their top capital priority is to move school administrative offices from Fishersville to Verona, a close second is charting the future of several county elementary schools.

School board members said during a work session Thursday that they will soon meet with the Augusta County Board of Supervisors to discuss the elementary priorities, which members start with renovating Cassell and Wilson elementary schools and eventually closing Ladd Elementary.

School Board Chairman Chad Shomo said the aging Ladd’s location in the congested West End of Waynesboro dictates the school’s future closing.

“Ladd is in a high density area,’’ he said.

The preliminary plan would call for spending more than $12 million each to increase the size of both Cassell and Wilson elementary schools and send a portion of Ladd’s 355 students to those schools, and also shuffle some of Ladd’s students to Stump Elementary in Stuarts Draft.

School board members and Superintendent Gary McQuain said any real elementary changes are years away because of the need to obtain financing for the renovations, and the time it takes for design, approval and construction.

Middle River School Board member David Shiflett said it is important for the school board to have a plan prepared for its elementary schools.

“They want a plan,’’ he said of county supervisors. “Funding is in their ballpark.”

McQuain will confer with Augusta County Administrator Pat Coffield today about a joint meeting date for the school board and supervisors to discuss elementary plans and funding.

Beyond the immediate elementary school concerns, school board members were told that renovations are also needed of Verona and Riverheads elementary schools.

Shiflett said he would like to see an aggressive strategy employed that would have the work on those schools follow the work at Cassell and Wilson.

McQuain does not favor a proposal made earlier this year by Augusta County Supervisor Tracy Pyles.

Pyles has proposed closing Beverley Manor Middle School, and increasing the number of grades at five elementary schools to include the sixth and seventh grade, and adding the eighth grade at both Riverheads and Buffalo Gap high schools.

McQuain said he could not support such a change.

“I could not offer those students the same opportunities as students in other middle schools,’’ he said.

McQuain said Augusta County has been committed to the middle school concept of having the sixth, seventh and eighth-grades together for decades.