Local schools hard to beat

Park County has fantastic schools. 

It’s no secret but deserves repeating thanks to even more signs recently affirming that fact. 

Recently, all three districts achieved graduation rates over 90%, with Meeteetse’s three graduates accounting for the entirety of its class, Park 1 coming in at a whopping 94% and Park 6 seeing a big rise to break above 90% at 90.9%. 

Graduation rates are a key way of determining a school’s value to the community it serves, and cut across so many other differences between communities. Simply put, the more of the local youths who achieve a high school diploma, the better. 

It’s achievements like this that, again, show clearly that our local school leaders know how to educate our students and deserve the freedom to allocate resources as needed to do so. So it was good to see the recalibration measures allow more flexibility by the time they were brought to the full Legislature.  Some of the concern of school districts may be a moot point, as the House recalibration bill failed to pass the two-thirds majority vote, although a similar Senate bill is still alive. 

But it’s not just the graduation rates. As a parent who has had kids at schools in Cody, and now Powell, and who recently has had the opportunity to do a lot more school coverage, I am forever in awe of what local students are doing. 

It was a pleasure to talk with Dawson George and Cambree Dicks in the wake of them being honored by Gov. Mark Gordon; it was a joy to take pictures of Classic Kindergarten Parkside students perform “The Three Little Pigs” in front of parents and staff; it was great to hear of the successes of Southside Elementary School at the last school board meeting; it was even fun, if a little unnerving, to take pictures of students — and some teachers — playing dodgeball to support Make a Wish week at the high school (I only got hit once). 

And I know full well there are great things going on in all of the schools and can’t wait to provide more coverage. 

Schools are one of the foundational building blocks of a community, therefore a good community should have good schools. 

Now I know many people on both sides of the recalibration issue are proposing legislation — or not — with students in mind and with an intent to give them the best education possible. And changes to the funding model were appreciated by Park 1 Superintendent Jay Curtis, who was less concerned about potential recalibration than before the changes. More funding is certainly good for the schools, but let’s ensure our top notch school staffs remain in charge of teaching our students. At least in Park County, I’d say it’s already hard to beat and the mantra: “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it,” most certainly applies.