Campuses realigning for growth
Our school district’s enrollment has increased significantly during the past several years. Six years ago we had 1,348 students and we now have 1,943 students. That is a 44% increase and is the highest percentage increase during that time period of all 76 school districts in the Waco region.
The Salado ISD voters approved a bond election last May to address our facility needs. The majority of the bond money will go towards building a new middle school located on Williams Road, south of our high school. Our new middle school is scheduled to open in August 2020. At that time, all students in grades six, seven, and eight will move from the schools on Thomas Arnold Road into the new middle school. Thus, only students in pre-kindergarten through fifth grade will remain in the schools on Thomas Arnold Road.
In anticipation of this change, this year we realigned our schools from four schools (pre-K through 2nd grade elementary school, 3rd grade through 6th grade intermediate school, 7th and 8th grade junior high school, and 9th grade through 12th grade high school) to three schools (pre-K through 5th grade elementary school, 6th grade through 8th grade middle school, and 9th grade through 12th grade high school). We also realigned our campus administrators from four principals and two assistant principals to three principals and three assistant principals.
While all three of our schools have the same administrative staff of one principal and one assistant principal, the enrollments of these three schools vary considerably. Our current campus enrollments are 579 students at our high school, 482 students at our middle school, and 882 students at our elementary school. We are going to add an assistant principal position at the elementary school for next year to support our pre-K through 5th grade students and employees. This is the first additional administrator we have added during my eight years in this school district. This new assistant principal position will bring the student to administrator ratio at the elementary school down to 294 students per administrator, which is very close to the ratios of 290 students per administrator for the high school and 241 students per administrator for the middle school.
Anyone interested in this position is welcome to complete an online application at https://salado.tedk12.com/hire/index.aspx or by going to our district website at www.saladoisd.org and then clicking on “departments” followed by “employment/personnel” followed by “job listings.”