Class was in session Monday night at the Monongalia County Board of Education.
The pupils were area lawmakers.
A handful of them came out for the informational gathering.
Mon Schools Superintendent Eddie Campbell Jr. said the idea was to present factoid snapshots of one of West Virginia’s more successful public school districts.
That was so they could have something to take with them to Charleston in January when the 2020 legislative session is gaveled in, he said.
The county isn’t bragging, though, the superintendent said.
All that success, he said, is relative.
That’s because Mon is still grappling with the same issues as the Mountain State’s 54 other public districts, the superintendent said.
While the county boasts a 95% attendance rate, he said, there’s still a negative number to offset the deal.
A total of 301 hearings have been held in magistrate court to date resulting from criminal truancy complaints submitted by the board this year.
Teachers have also been absent during roll call, Campbell said.
A total of 9% have missed more than 20 days this year, he said, and 54% have called in sick for more than 10 days.
“Those are a lot of absences,” he said.
In a county singled out for prosperity and growth, there are still 292 students here officially identified as homeless — meaning they don’t have a permanent roof over their heads.
They could be staying in Bartlett House, a city homeless shelter, for example.
Or, sleeping on a friend’s couch.
Either way, the superintendent said, they aren’t residing at a fixed address.
Through April of this year, the BOE counted 196 students in the foster system here — but with just 32 homes in the county certified for foster care.
“That’s the number that worries me,” Campbell said.
What worries Sen. Roman Prezioso, he said, is the malaise of a partisan divide in the state’s House and Senate.
Such rancor, he said, doesn’t help counties with languishing students and education budgets that don’t go far enough.
Prezioso, D-Marion, is the Senate minority leader about to embark on his final legislative session next month.
The 70-year-old, who is a retired teacher and school administrator, isn’t seeking reelection.
He’ll cap a career in public life that includes more than 30 years in the House and Senate.
There’s only one way to give marginalized students better footing in school, he said.
That’s by hiring additional counselors, psychologists and other mental health professionals, he said.
“You can’t teach a kid who can’t concentrate because of all the bad stuff that’s at home,” he said.
In 2017, for example, the community health professionals who were watching said 54 of every 1,000 in West Virginia were affected by the state’s overwhelming opioid epidemic — and that was twice the national average that year.
New hires, however, mean new paychecks, the senator said.
And new paychecks, he said, are likely going to be scarcer in the state come 2020 than they normally are.
That’s because the fiscal experts who are watching said West Virginia is poised to spiral into its worst economic downturn in a decade.
Add all the above to the tense, argumentative dynamic that takes over every legislative session, Prezioso said.
“We hear the same thing from every board of education across the state,” he said.
“And then we take it all back to Charleston, and we get on the floor, and preach and preach and preach, and it all falls on deaf ears.”
