Balanced Calendar Back on Agenda

Northeast Cobb school board representative David Banks proposes today to start the next school year Aug. 1.

Trimmed Wheeler Project Set for Approval

The Cobb County Board of Education also will honor the district's teachers of the year but won't change the rules for employee disciplinary conferences.

The Cobb County Board of Education will vote on a scaled-back $17 million renovation project for East Cobb's Wheeler High School at the board's monthly meeting tonight at 7 in the Central Office boardroom. The low construction bid for the project from Hogan Construction Group came in $2.6 million over budget, but Doug Shepard, the chief administrative officer for the school district's SPLOST projects, told the board at its Aug. 10 work session that the project will remain at its budgeted $17 million. Shepard said the school system eliminated several aspects from the original scope of the project—such as improvements to the drama, culinary arts and horticulture programs and the undersized theater—to maintain the budget. “Rising construction…

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Hinojosa Promises to Listen, Not Make Radical Changes

The Cobb school superintendent finalist says his salary will be about $237,000 if the Board of Education hires him.

Michael Hinojosa inspires some, offers hope for others and leaves lingering doubts for still others as he finalizes details to become Cobb County’s 20th school superintendent. The Cobb County School District’s sole finalist for superintendent met the media with many answers and greeted the public with plenty of handshakes at Campbell High School’s media center Monday afternoon. Hinojosa, the six-year superintendent of the Dallas Independent School District in Texas, started his first workweek since the Cobb Board of Education announced his selection Thursday by meeting the district’s school principals and the system's Executive Cabinet, then had lunch with school board members. He spent the final 75 minutes of his whirlwind tour at …

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PatchCast

PatchCast: East Cobb school upset with school board; 5-year-old's painting off to Washington; Hillgrove Hawks rally; Wakeboarders at Allatoona

Here's a roundup of the region's major developments for May 19.

The read on these stories or others, see here: Hightower Trail School Council Chastises Cobb School Board – East Cobb Patch 5-Year-Old's Painting Headed to Washington D.C. – Douglasville Patch Hawks Headed to Semis with 7-6 Win – Powder Springs-Lithia Springs Patch Wakeboarders Show Off Tricks on Lake Allatoona – Acworth Patch

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Moms Talk

Advanced Placement, Advancement Overload?

A mom at Keheley Elementary wonders whether overbooking kids--on the hunt for academic success--has too many downsides.

The College Board announced Cobb County School District is among just 388 public school systems in the nation to earn a place on the distinguished Advanced Placement (AP) Achievement List.  Cobb kids take AP calculus and AP physics; Kell High School's engineering club is headed to a robotics championship; there's a chamber orchestra; visual arts and, of course, the indefatigable sports teams. Jammed into those multi-colored, sticky-noted and highlighted calendars might just be community service, driver's ed, part-time work and, if they're really super lucky, a few left over hours in a week to chill with their family and family dog. When you are the product of several national blue ribbon schools, with UGA as hopeful a higher-ed option as …

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School Board Hears SPLOST Opposition

The Cobb board also bids farewell to three members during its last meeting of the year.

Cobb County's political buzzword of recent weeks, SPLOST, made a prominent appearance at the county Board of Education's meeting Thursday night. But the discussion had nothing to do with the Board of Commissioners' pending decision on whether to send a renewal of the county's 1-cent sales tax for capital projects before voters March 15. Instead, the school board faced criticism and discussion about its own use of a 1-cent Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax, separate from the tax the county and municipalities use to finance roads, parks, libraries and other infrastructure projects. The county SPLOST will expire at the end of 2011 unless commissioners approve a referendum and voters aprove the tax's extension. (The county has cut that …

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