Ohio County Board of Education Hears Pitch To Separate Warwood School
Emma Delk Trending
WHEELING -- Warwood School Principal James Rowing shared information with Ohio County Board of Education members regarding a proposed move to reclassify Warwood School as separate elementary and middle schools for the 2025 school year and beyond.
The need for separation, outlined by Rowing at the Monday meeting, stems from the current evaluation of the academic performance of Warwood School that does not consider "the limitations due to the amalgamation of various grade levels under one roof."
Going on to explain the West Virginia Department of Education's Balanced Scorecard does not consider sixth-grade general summative assessment scores in traditional middle schools, Rowing noted Warwood sixth grade is included in this assessment since it is part of one unified school.
"The approach fails to account for the subtle decline in test scores that often accompanies a transition from fifth to sixth grade," said Rowing. "We believe that splitting the school will yield a more precise representation of our test scores for both Warwood Middle School and Warwood Elementary School."
Hoping the separation will streamline data analysis for Warwood School, Rowing added that the reclassification will also allow for a streamlined decision-making process for the students at each school.
Each school would now have separate administrations, with a principal that would oversee each along with "possibly a part-time dean," according to Superintendent Kim Miller.
"While every student's needs are of paramount importance, they vary significantly across different age levels," said Rowing. "The streamlined approach will empower administrators to address these needs properly, positively impacting both students and the overall school environment."
Rowing noted the measure is also expected to "alleviate the administrative turnover" that has "plagued Warwood School" since the merger.
Stating he was "all in favor" of the separation, board member David Croft wondered how the change would affect a fifth grader and whether they would "notice this leadership difference." The only way the change would affect the elementary students would be "just knowing which administrator they would go to," responded Rowing.
Board member Molly Aderholt wondered why the schools were merged in the first place, with board member Erik Schramm clarifying the combination happened primarily to save money and for Warwood School to receive more federal funding by having more kids within one school.
With the reclassification of the schools, federal funding would not be affected, noted Rowing, as Title 1 funding based on a school's number of poor children would not be changed. He explained that he could "still count the same amount of Title 1 funding students in those two buildings in two separate schools."
Seeing the cost for the separation to be "fairly minimal," as the assistant principal and principal of Warwood School would simply be delegated to the elementary and middle schools, Aderholt wondered what the next steps were to enact the reclassification.
On the next steps, Miller outlined that if the board is in favor of the reclassification, Warwood School's comprehensive educational facility plan will be amended into two separate plans. After that separation is made, the information would be submitted to the West Virginia Board of Education for approval.
"It's not a closure. We're not closing a school," added Miller. "We're basically just realigning the school so that we can dedicate our resources more age-appropriately."
Clarifying that the "goal would be to change more on the inside than the outside," Rowing conferred with Miller that the merger will strive to help school faculty "get from point A to point Z faster."
"Those schools will still be called Vikings, though, we're not changing that," joked board president Andy Garber -- himself a former Warwood School principal. "We can have mini Vikings and big Vikings."