Tuesday, August 31, 1999
Mason grows by 717 pupils
School hours, routes adjusted
BY SUE KIESEWETTER
Enquirer Contributor
MASON — The buses start rolling at 6:15 a.m. And they keep rolling — on triple routes to cope with the rapidly growing enrollment.
School leaders in Mason expected growth, and planned for it. But the latest numbers were still more than anticipated.
After a record-setting 580 new students last year, figures released Monday — one week after school began — showed enrollment at 6,028. That's a 13.5 percent increase — 717 students — from last year's official count of 5,311 students.
That number may fluctuate between now and Ohio's official enrollment count taken the first week of October, said Shelly Benesh, district spokeswoman.
The official count is important to schools because it is used in a formula that determines how much state aid school districts receive each year. State officials do not adjust the figure as students enter or withdraw during the school year.
“Five hundred eighty was a record for us last year,” Ms. Benesh said. “We blew that out of the water. We expected quite a few (new students) but nobody expected this. We were predicting close to 600 students.”
The immediate result: triple routing for buses and school starting times that must be changed. There are also continuing adjustments in bus routes. Bill Frauenknecht, transportation director, said the routing system means buses begin leaving the garage about 6:15 a.m. to pick up students who attend Mason High School and Mason Middle School.
Once those students are dropped off, drivers go out to pick up students who attend Mason Intermediate and Western Row schools.
After those drop-offs, drivers pick up children who attend Mason Heights and Mason Early Childhood Center.
The district has added eight routes since August 1998, bringing the total to 63, Mr. Frauenknecht said. Starting times for several buildings changed this year and will change again when children return from the Labor Day holiday on Sept. 7, Ms. Benesh said.
The new times are:
• Mason High School, 7:25 a.m.-2:20 p.m.
• Mason Middle School, 7:15 a.m.-2:05 p.m.
• Mason Intermediate and Western Row, 8:30 a.m.-3 p.m.
• Mason Heights, 9:25 a.m.-3:55 p.m.
• Mason Early Childhood Center: morning, 9:15 a.m.-
noon; afternoon, 1-3:50 p.m.
“There will be some new routes in the future,” Mr. Frauenknecht said. “We can't add new routes until the 13 new buses we ordered are de livered by the end of September. We'll make adjustments where we can.”
In the 10 days before school started on Aug. 23, more than 300 new students enrolled in the district. The transportation department processed 500 requests for bus stop changes, said Cary Furniss, the district's business manager and treasurer.
“We're struggling with the growth,” Mr. Furniss said. “We're working really hard to make changes. All we can do (when things go wrong) is apologize to our parents.”
Mr. Furniss said he doesn't expect any more days like last week, when children were getting home from school more than an hour after their scheduled time.
The teaching staff has also been beefed up, said Craig Ullery, director of human resources.
The district hired 73 profession als, most of them classroom teachers. To accommodate growth, 40 of the 73 were hired for new positions. The others replaced retiring teachers or those leaving for other reasons.
“We're done with staffing for now,” Mr. Ullery said. “We'll start hiring again in January or February for the 2000-2001 year.
“We're tentatively budgeted for 45 new positions for growth for 2000-2001,” he said.
Of the 73 people hired this year, 23 were first-year teachers, Mr. Ullery said. Of the 50 who had experience, 22 hold master's degrees.
Since 1994, when Mason's enrollment was 3,450, the district has gained 2,578 students, an increase of nearly 75 percent in five years.
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