Associate Supt. Dave Bennett, along with other Person County Schools senior central office staff, gave the board an overview of goals for the ensuing year. The new recruitment/retention plan was near the top of Bennett’s list.

He hopes to form a team of volunteers composed of teachers and administrators to help determine needs and form a plan of action for principals.

Bennett also hopes to modernize and streamline all human resources systems, processes, procedures and policies to make it easier for employees and potential employees to find the information they seek regarding employment, salaries, benefits, evaluations, board policies and continuing education units.

He said an electronic application on the school system’s Web site would become “the basis of the personnel file and electronic demographic database.” He told the board that he wanted to scan personnel files and maintain them electronically in order to clear out the room in central office that now houses employee files.

The school system’s employee handbook also eventually would be accessible on the Web site, Bennett said.

Assistant superintendents Sandy Davis and Maggie Whitt told the school board Tuesday that their main goals would be improving curriculum, assessment, student achievement and preventing drop outs.

Davis said the ninth grade is often where students are lost. She hopes to be able to place more emphasis on student support and remediation at the freshman level in order to give students more ownership and a greater sense of success, thus hopefully keeping them in school until graduation.

Improving math achievement in grades six through 12 would be key in this effort, Davis said.

Whitt hopes to offer more professional development and joint planning for elementary teachers and to improve the curriculum and assessment, particularly at the kindergarten through grade two level.

Schools Supt. Dr. Larry W. Cartner provided the school board a rough draft strategic plan for 2008-2011. He said he asked staff to “dream” about what they would like to see happen in the school system and provide feedback for use in the plan draft.

Cartner asked the board members to look over the draft for comment later.

Included in the draft is the development and implementation of a long-range funding model “to keep PCS at or above state average in current expense funding.”