In Feb. 28-Mar. 5 issue

The final day of the Russell County School calendar has now been extended to May 22 and at this point any other additional missed days will have to added to the end of the year.

Russell County Schools will be altering their regular schedules for the remainder of the school year to help compensate for time missed due to the weather and missed days due to sickness.

Russell County Board of Education school board members voted to allow Principals to alter school schedules to make up at least “34 minutes” of instructional time on a daily basis to offset the amount of instructional time students have already missed this school year.

Superintendent Scott Pierce says the “34 minutes” of additional daily instruction will be “absorbed” during the normal hours.

The added time will not require a change in either the starting or ending times for local schools.

These times are adjusted by shortening recess periods and beak time between classes.

According to Pierce, by extending the school schedule by “34 minutes” on a daily basis, a total of 5 days can be made up.

Russell County Schools already have two days built into their schedule, which would then require an additional three days to be made up.

State law requires students to have at least 1,062 hours of instruction during the school year. Russell County students have missed 10.5 days of classes due to bad weather and sickness.

With this plan ... if no additional days are missed ... Russell County Schools will adjourn for summer break on May 22.

Final bids were awarded for the completion of the new natatorium now under construction at the High School and Middle School campus.

Branscum construction was awarded the bid to construct the swimming pool portion of the building at a cost of $802,000.

This building is targeted for completion in December of this year.

The building will house classrooms, meeting rooms, an auditorium and the Olympic sized swimming pool.

Construction is well underway on the new Laker Band building project.

Constructed at the rear of the gymnasium of the high school and adjoining the present band room, this project is now some 75 percent complete.

The section formerly housing the band room will be renovated into classrooms.

The board meeting was held Monday night at the Russell County Board of Education in Jamestown.