West Feliciana Parish News

West Feliciana Middle School is one of 56 schools in the nation recognized by the technology company Apple Inc. as a “school of distinction” for 2012, West Feliciana Parish school officials announced this week.

The school was selected for its one-to-one technology program, in which each student in the school is given either a laptop computer or an iPad device to use at school and at home.

Representatives of the company will visit the school during an 8 a.m. March 2 student achievement recognition assembly, Superintendent Hollis Milton said.

“We’re very happy to be recognized. This is very huge when you consider the small number of schools that are recognized. I think it builds a bridge for strong relations in the future with Apple, their products and what we provide relative to education and student achievement,” Milton said.

The West Feliciana Parish school system began what it calls its “1:1 initiative” with sixth-graders in the class of 2007-08. The state, under a program started by then-Gov. Kathleen Blanco, provided grants to school systems across the state for students in selected classes to get laptop computers.

When some school systems declined to participate, West Feliciana obtained extra grant money to assign them to all of its sixth-graders.

Gov. Bobby Jindal vetoed a $2.5 million legislative appropriation to continue the grant program in July 2008, but then-School Superintendent Lloyd Lindsey persuaded the West Feliciana School Board to expand the program to a new group of sixth-graders with local funds.

In 2010, West Feliciana voters approved a new, half-cent sales tax, with part of the money earmarked to continue the one-to-one program.

Milton credited Principal Ben Necaise for Apple’s recognition of the school.

“He is such a strong leader, and has a strong vision for technology as it relates to teaching and learning,” Milton said.

Some 410 students are using Apple MacBook laptops as their 1:1 device, while 100 students are piloting iPad computers. Every student and staff member is issued a Mac device at the beginning of the school year and returns it to be re-imaged at the end of the year.

Necaise, said one of the most important aspects of the program “is its ability to level the educational playing field” by providing students with equal access to such technology and resources.

For her depiction of a white pelican through the use of natural and recycled material, Brittany Stagg, 15, won her school $6,000 for supplies through America’s Wetland Foundation.

Stagg, a 10th-grader at West Feliciana High School, was one of nine students in the state awarded $5,000 for either an essay, photo or art that depicts wetland issues. In addition, Stagg was named the overall winner in the art competition, so she earned an additional $1,000 for her school.

“I was surprised because I didn’t understand at first,” she said Thursday when it was announced over the school intercom that she had won. “This is my first year of taking art at school.”

Her art teacher, Killian Williams, said he submitted Stagg’s work, along with a number of other student works, to the contest through America’s Wetland Foundation and found out she won last week. It’s been hard to not say anything until the official announcement Thursday, he said.

Williams said Stagg was struggling with the project and had said she didn’t think she would win.

“We’re very proud,” he said, adding that he got to see all the work before it was submitted to the contest and called the students’ work impressive.

The contest was run through the America’s Wetland Foundation, a nonprofit group with a mission to help raise awareness about coastal Louisiana land loss. Students were asked to answer the questions of how Louisiana can adapt to coastal land loss and why should the coastal wetlands be saved, according to a news release from the foundation.

In addition to having the winners announced on World Wetlands Day on Thursday, the event also marks the start of the organization’s 10th year in existence.

“The success of the contest’s purpose is illustrated by the closing lines of the overall winning essay, written by sixth-grader Justin Hugger, 11, of Metairie. He wrote, “It is a choice to save the wetlands. Let’s all make a personal decision to do this,” Val Marmillion, the foundation’s managing director, said in a news release.

Postlethwaite and Netterville auditors reported to the West Feliciana Parish School Board Tuesday that the district would get an “A” rating based on legislative criteria for its 2010-2011 audit report.

Auditors Mike Schexnayder and Rodney Combs said the school district met all government accounting standards, it had no thefts, its deadlines were met and the books were “in very good shape.”

In spite of the good audit, Schexnayder said the board was facing financial challenges because of rising retirement, health-care and other mandated costs.

Superintendent Hollis G. Milton detailed those increased costs, which he said are averaging about $500,000 annually, and include:

• $116,000 in the teacher retirement system.

• $27,500 in the Louisiana School Employees Retirement System.

• $100,000 in group health and life insurance increase.

• $30,000 fuel costs reimbursement to contracted bus drivers.

• $92,000 if a salary freeze is lifted for all employees with one year of experience

• $185,000 if the salary freeze is lifted for all employees with two years of experience.

Milton also reported that the MFP funding, state aid for public schools, has decreased because of the loss of student enrollment in the parish.

Board secretary-treasurer Helen “Ruthie” Davis said 5-year and 10-year financial projections are nearly impossible because of the continued increases of mandated costs and the general economic conditions of the state and the nation.

“If I had to make a projection now,” said David, “it would be bleak.” She said it was also too early to tell what traffic impact the new bridge might or might not have on the economy of the parish.

Milton said that the school district had closed Tunica Elementary School and cut eight teachers because of the loss of student enrollment. He said that the board must look at the possibility of finding other revenues.

After discussion, the board said it would consider looking into the possibility of a proposing a new half-cent sales tax, renewing a 3.75 millage, which supports all employees in salaries and benefits, and proposing a new 2 mill property tax for operations that would replace another 2-mill property tax that is set to expire this year.

The judge in the Angola 5 murder case on Tuesday rescinded an earlier order appointing a New Orleans nonprofit law group to appeal inmate Jeffrey Cameron Clark’s death sentence, but questions remain about which agency would fund the legal battle to save Clark’s life.

Retired Orleans Judge Jerome M. Winsberg granted a motion on June 3 relieving court-appointed trial attorneys Tommy Damico and Joe Lotwick from further responsibility in the case after a jury convicted Clark of first-degree murder and sentenced him to death in May.

The June 3 order also appointed the Capital Appeals Project to handle Clark’s required direct appeal to the state Supreme Court.

Clark is one of five Angola prisoners accused in the Dec. 28, 1999, beating and stabbing death of security Capt. David C. Knapps during an attempted escape from a prison camp.

The Capital Appeals Project is a nonprofit group that receives funding from the Louisiana Public Defender Board and other sources for handling capital cases.

Lawyers for the organization filed a motion asking Winsberg to order the state Office of Corrections Services to show cause Tuesday why the agency should not fund Clark’s appeal, as it has done in prosecuting and defending the five inmates since 2004.

Corrections attorneys Jonathan Vining and Billy Kline said the agency is not responsible for Clark’s appeal costs because the state law requiring it to pay for the prosecution does not mention appeals.

Kline said Corrections has paid almost $7 million to prosecute and defend the five at the trial level.

Requiring Corrections to pay for the appeals would put the agency into a deficit, Kline said.

Kline and Vining also said another state law specifically requires the state Public Defender Board to handle the appeals of indigent people sentenced to death in Louisiana.

Attorneys Ben Cohen and Bidish Sarma said the state board adopted a resolution on Aug. 17 that says the board is not responsible for the appeal costs because the Capital Appeals Project was appointed under the statute dealing with crimes committed in state prisons.

Winsberg agreed with the state attorneys that Clark’s appellate attorneys were appointed under the wrong statute and said he is appointing the state Public Defender Board to take the case.

Friends of West Feliciana Parish sheriff’s Capt. Michael Taylor, a cancer patient, are organizing a “Country Fair for a Country Boy” all day on Aug. 6 at the Elm Park Rodeo Arena.

The benefit includes a rodeo, trail ride, lunch, food, music and children’s activities.