Does the Park City School Board Violate Open Meeting Laws?

In 1977, the State of Utah passed the Open Meetings Act (OMA). Its purpose is to ensure that “the state, its agencies, and its political subdivisions take their actions openly and conduct their deliberations openly.” By most measures, the School Board is one of the most open political groups in our community. Every meeting is …

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Should further detail be provided about school class sizes?

We received a submission from a citizen: We agree that having detailed information is important in order to make good decisions. Therefore we support the effort to obtain class sizes and ratios related to dual immersion. We would recommend that this citizen contact the School Superintendent, Ember Conley, at . If you don’t get the run-around she’ll …

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During yesterday’s school board discussion regarding dual immersion, it was stated that Europe’s standard is that students learn two foreign languages. Is that true?

“The standard now for Europe is that kids know 3 languages, 2 plus their own.” -Update on the status of dual immersion 10/7/2014 Park City School Board Meeting Dual immersion seems to be a hot topic with many people concerned about it for different reasons. Some are worried because their kids can’t get in. Some are …

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Current Class Sizes and Enrollment Growth of Our Elementary Schools

The School Board has published updated stats about elementary school class sizes and enrollment numbers as Park City Schools. Some take-aways include: All of our elementary schools average 23 students per class, with the exception of McPolin at 21 District-wide 4th grade had the largest student/teacher ratio at 25 The lowest was 17 students per teacher in …

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School District Discussion on Budget and Future

We have been as hard on the Park City School District related to financial matters. They are in a very complex spot that is going to require some out of the box thinking. However, the budget discussion below shows promise. They discuss everything from the impact of Vail, to second homes, to student numbers. If …

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Are Park City’s kids college ready? Better than most but not perfect.

The Park City School District published the 2014 College Readiness Letter from ACT, an organization that provides a standardized test used by many colleges as a factor in admittance. The really encouraging news is that Park City students were about 25% more prepared for college classwork than their counterparts in other Utah schools. The results varied from 88% of students being college …

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PC CAPS is Teaching our Children the Wrong Lesson

During April 2012 there was a heated debate over whether to start the PC CAPS program, an initiative by the Park City School system to provide real-world experience to high school students through hands on projects. During 2012 there was also a budget crisis within the school system. They needed to slash $4.7 million from …

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Can the Park City School District Be Saved From Itself (and Us)?

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”  –-Walt Kelly On Thursday night the Park City School Board voted to increase taxes in order to cover a shortfall and raise $3+ million per year. The reasons communicated by various board members include the need for more teachers due to increased enrollment, enrollment by out of …

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