Chamber members and guests attended the North Royalton School District’s (NRSD) State of the Schools address, presented by North Royalton School Superintendent Greg Gurka. The event, held on Wednesday, April 18, at Carrie Cerino’s Ristorante. The Chamber of Commerce luncheon event was sponsored by the Cuyahoga Valley Career Center.
School Superintendent, Greg Gurka began the presentation by noting the district’s mission: to “inspire and empower learners.” He thanked voters for the passage of the bond issue last year. “There is no doubt our district is going from “good to great” and that is evident in the decisive victory of the district’s bond issue this past May. The community spoke loud and clear that we need to go from ‘good to great’ and the passage of the bond issue will allow the district and community to meet the needs of our students now and for the next generation,” he said.
Gurka noted that the efforts to greatness do not “ happen by accident.” He talked about the district’s strategic plan, which was first adopted in 2010, which focus on community engagement, student achievement, communications, facilities, financial and collaboration. The district is in the final year of a three year plan and are looking to adopt a new 5 year plan in August.
“Financially, our bottom line is strong which is made possible through sound financial decision making in budgeting, staffing, purchasing and investment strategy,” said Gurka. “Our day-to-day processes will allow us to extend an operating levy approved in 2009 and designed to last three years, to last until at least 2020.” He noted that even with a financially positive outlook, all districts are beholden to the state’s biennium budget, which can change the financial landscape. He noted that the renewal of the emergency levies, while not increasing taxes, “are critical to our continued financial health and the ability to maintain our current programs and services.”
Gurka said that student achievement is the main focus of the strategic plan. “We take great pride in our vision of identifying individual student needs and providing comprehensive supports to meet those needs.” He talked about the annual report card, which breaks down as follows:
B – Achievement
C – K-3 Literacy
B – Gap Closing
B – Value Added Progress
C – Prepared for Success
A – Graduation Rate
“While the grades are not “bad” it is hard to look at letter grades out of context,” said Gurka. “In some of the ratings, a C means that the indicator was met. Or, in regards to K-3 literacy, this in no way means our students are not passing the third grade reading assessment. In fact, almost 100% of our third graders pass that assessment. Why then would we have a C in K-3 literacy? Because there is a formula that is used to determine if we put the correct children on reading improvement plans at the right time in order to get them reading at grade level by third grade. So, we have a “C” in K-3 literacy, but I still think having 100% of the third graders pass the third grade reading assessment is a good way to tell if we are providing the appropriate instruction and intervention.” He said that a better determination, in his opinion, is the Quality Profile, which can be found on the district’s website. “This document highlights all the things that school districts do each and every day. This is a comprehensive report and not one based on standardized tests that are a snapshot of one day.”
Gurka then turned his attention toward facilities and showed a preliminary time line for new elementary school, which started in the winter of 2017 with a schematic design and is completed with the grand opening in the Fall of 2020. He noted that earlier last year, the district secured a “double A 2” credit rating from Moody’s Financial, allowing the district to sell $88.9 million dollars in bonds at a favorable interest rate. He said the Middle School projects will be completed in phases. He then showed sketches of what the high school new elementary school could look like, both inside and out. He said that with the $89 million investment, “an estimated $600,00 of additional income taxes and about $20,000 in ancillary business will be brought into the city, with the new construction.
“As we work on the design and renovation of our buildings, we want you to know that safety and security are always a priority for our District. Our schools should be places where students are comfortable and feel safe and secure, not just physically safe, but socially and emotionally safe. To accomplish this, it takes a collective effort of our communities, and we all have to take responsibility in the effort.” Gurka talked about the district-wide bullying prevention program, the Safer0H helpline that allow anonymity to report an incident or situation, an updated plan with the district’s School Resource Officer and periodic fire/tornado/lockdown drills. Gurka noted that the staff is “trained in the ALICE protocols, which stand for Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, and Evacuate.” The security plan is filed with the Ohio Department of Education, the State Attorney General’s office, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and local police and fire departments. “We regularly collaborate with our local safety authorities to keep our schools as safe as possible. In addition, all of our buildings have camera systems that our administrators can access on their desktop computers, tablets, and phones to see live feeds. The North Royalton safety forces also have access to these live camera feeds. All of these things are designed to make our schools safe for students and staff while still providing a caring, nurturing environment.”
Gurka talked about the rapidly changing world. “Our facilities plan is designed to be flexible and adaptive to allow for increased communication and collaboration among our students.” He noted that the connectivity will allow students “to work on real world problems and work together to learn about each other, our cultures, our beliefs so that they can make the world a better place. Our children have opportunities to communicate and collaborate and learn about things world wide that we never thought of prior to this. Our duty and responsibility is to give them the tools to allow them to do this.”

By GLORIA PLEVA KACIK
Contributing Writer