Saugerties High School principal highlights successes in year of challenges

While a pair of federal pandemic aid packages totaling around $6.5 million will help the Saugerties Central School District shape its academic offerings over the next few years, Saugerties High School Principal Timothy Reid recently detailed how secondary students are already benefitting from recent changes. 

Reid spoke during a meeting of the Board of Education held on Tuesday, July 13. Appropriately, the meeting represented the end of one school year and the beginning of another. While the principal’s presentation covered initiatives enacted during the 2020-21 school year, Reid said they represent the start of something new for Saugerties High at a time when the school, the community and the world at large is hoping to move forward from the COVID-19 pandemic.  

“In spite of COVID and in spite of it being a difficult year for our students and staff, the parents and the community, I wanted to just highlight some of the successes that we had here at the high school,” said Reid. Among them was a restructuring of the special education department, which Reid — a former special education teacher — said was designed to give students a great focus on achievement.  

“I met with teachers, we discussed issues and concerns that they had,” Reid said. “I took notes of concerns from parents, we discussed possible solutions and collaborated.” The change in part moved to a co-teaching model, with a general education teacher and special education teacher working together in the classroom. 

“When the model really works well, there’s very little difference between the two teachers,” Reid said. “You’re seeing both teachers walking around and helping every student in the class, and all students benefit from that model.

The new approach also sees the district moving away from a resource room with the introduction of a skills course that was a success in its pilot program with seniors during 2020-21 and will be bridged down to all grade levels in the future. 

“The resource room covered about 75 percent of our (special education) programs last year,” Reid said. “It sits in the student’s schedule and they receive support for their other classes, but they do not receive credit for it. It’s valuable, but I come from the philosophy that every minute that a student is in…a classroom, I want them to have the opportunity to earn a high school credit…The instructional skills class is one step in that direction.”

The high school also added a handful of popular general education courses last year, including sociology, human geography and college-level classes in biology, environmental science, United States history, and library studies. 

Echoing team-based initiatives in the district’s elementary schools, Saugerties High recently moved to  support team structure, including guidance counselors, social workers, school psychologists, nurses and administrators. 

“We started these weekly meetings with this group of people with a focus on academic needs, social and emotional, mental health needs and behavioral needs,” Reid said, noting that it was particularly timely. “They really helped us support students who were struggling with (the) COVID (pandemic), and they helped us get students across the (graduation) stage.”

Students were also involved in helping one another last year, with a peer-to-peer mentoring group through student council; a video supporting incoming sixth graders created by the mum queen and court; and various Key Club activities, including aiding in a vaccination clinic and helping ninth graders who began the year studying remotely get acclimated to the high school campus when they returned to the classroom. 

“It comes from this idea that students want to help others and make things better,” Reid said. “It’s impressive and it’s certainly something that we should all be very, very proud of.” 

The principal added that the changes and extra effort appeared to be working as high school graduation rates rose from 84 percent in 2019-20 to 87.5 percent in 2020-21. 

“I’m very proud of my staff and all the supports they’ve given to students this year,” Reid said, adding that the improved graduation rate was a step in the right direction but that there was still work to be done. 

“We’re going to continue to look at dropout rates and identify those precursors,” he said. “The whole idea is to catch those kids early on so we don’t get to the point where they’re considering dropping out or they become credit deficient. That’s all part of my future plan and I’m extremely committed to increasing that score.”

Some of that effort will be aided through federal pandemic aid, which the district is still figuring out. The Coronavirus Response and Relief Act (CRRSA) signed in December 2020 will bring the SCSD $2,299,905, and the American Rescue Plan Act (ARP) signed in March 2021 will include a direct allocation of $3,506,481, plus an additional $700,000 earmarked for learning loss. With both grants, school districts are working under a time crunch: CSRRA funding must be spent by September 30, 2023, and ARP funding must be spent by September 30, 2024.

The next meeting of the SCSD Board of Education is scheduled for Tuesday, August 10.