The Borrego Springs Unified School District held their monthly board meeting Wednesday Feb. 12 in the community room at the high school, where members of the board, schools, and the community shared updates and statements.

The meeting began with Steve Riehle, president of the board, sharing a report from the closed board session.

The ‘Students of the Month’ recognition's for the elementary, middle and high school were followed presented by principal’s Sherrilynn Polanco and Victoria Baay, but not all students were present to be recognized.

Students of the Month for the elementary school were – Eduardo Castillo, Brisa Valadez, Anthony Cecena, Emma Sanson, Kate Leffel, Lizet Bravo, Dagoberto Cabrera, and Franky Rojas.

For the middle and high school – Anavey Gonzalez, Valentina Villareal, Nicholas Moll, Dylan Rodriguez, Quintin Rufino, Aide Valdez and Juan Carlos Vilchez.

After a brief break and approval of previous board meeting minutes, Polanco shared her report for updates from the elementary school. She reported on their teacher meetings. On the last Monday in January, the staff reviewed student writing samples, a habit they got into doing when Martha Deichler was principal.

She noted that it is beneficial as teachers are able to notice the strengths of the students with areas to improve on, as well as be able to analyze how students in the year below and above are writing. This is so that the teachers can see if students need improvement, and be able to prepare them for what is to come.

Polanco went on to discuss dyslexia module procedures, along with giving a hand out to the board. The hand out showed and explained the areas to master in reading, then why and last how to comprehend and do it.

She stated that there is a new volunteer at the elementary school, Katie Lee, who is a retired teacher from Oregon. She is currently training in dyslexia learning, and is screening students to see if they are reading at grade level. As time goes on, Polanco hopes that Lee will be able to help more students at a time. She also offered her services to Baay at the high school.

She briefly discussed her recent meeting/trip with Baay, and noted that they discovered a few free learning resources and curricula. These curricula vary and include helping students with anger management, depression, etc. Polanco noted that they often know who they are, but don’t really have the training to comprehend and fully help.

She shared that there is also a new great trick for the students in regards to taking breaks. They have an allotted time for breaks daily, while using passes. If they have extra passes after an amount of time, the student will be able to turn it in for another activity. She sees this as a way to motivate the students to control/manage their behavior.

Baay followed with her report on the middle and high school, beginning with reporting about the middle school basketball tournament being hosted at the high school. She then discussed the implementation of the “Math Academy,” a pro-gram designed similar to BASIC’s Summer Learning Academy.

They are currently trying a pro-gram teacher Tracy Eddie from the elementary school has been using.

Full article in the Feb. 20 issue of the Borrego Sun.