Thursday, April 3, 2014

West Buffalo Charter adds ‘Core,' expands


By Oliver Colbert and Kimberly Hylton
Bengal News West reporters
            West Buffalo Charter School has adopted the Common Core standards for learning and added more than 100 second- and third-grade students to its building on Lafayette Avenue.
            Third grade teacher Rachel Banas under the Common Core, student are not just solving problems, they're thinking them through and making connections.
          “It’s challenging but you see their thinking has changed,” Banas said.
            WBCS has small classes with a total of 24 students, a teacher and teacher’s assistant. In addition to the assistant.
A smaller classroom leaves room for teachers to help students more affectively. Teachers at WBCS can figure out what level each student is at and help them grow.  Principal Andrea Todoro  says smaller classes also make it easier to enforce the Common Core curriculum. 
            The support doesn’t stop with just teachers and students. Parents are also supporters of the new curriculum at WBCS. Todoro said that the school hosted parent nights where  the differences between thenew curriculum and the old were compared and explained .  Parents have also been invited in to see Common Core being taught.
            “I think once you empower them with knowledge they understand what it is and they can see it coming home in their child’s book bag and then they respond positively,” said Principal Todoro said.  
            Along with the new curriculum WBCS has recently added a class of second graders and three third grade classes of third grade. The  additional grades brought more than 100 students to the school. Todoro said the biggest impacts of the new students are space and budget.
            “There are more bodies in the school so traffic flow, use of the lunchroom and scheduling is all impacted by the additional students,” Todoro said.
             Todoro said planning for the extra classrooms, purchasing the furniture and the technology, and staffing has impacted the budget.
            WBSC’s had originally planned to expand out of the building creating a new wing, four floors total, and a new gymnasium. Those plans have been put on hold. Instead the school will add fourth grade classes and renovate the first floor. The original plans were denied by the State of Education because the charter school is too  new, Todoro said . The cost of the original expansion would have been $2 million. WBSC has worked out a new plan to renovate the first floor where the cafeteria is located along with a long corridor hall. The new project will add three new classrooms for the incoming fourth graders this  May. The project will cost WBCS $400,000 including furniture and technology.
            “We’ve made use of every inch of the building now that we’ve been in here for a couple of years. We know what spaces we’re utilizing and what spaces we’re not…so we’re reworking the interior,” said finance and operations officer, Elizabeth Sterns.
            Although school leaders were disappointed that the school  couldn’t expand the way they intended, they  are still excited to be renovating.
            “I’m really excited about it, it’s an opportunity for us to take what we already have and make it better. I think it’s more fiscally conservative to do it the way we’re doing it. It’s kind of like staying in your starter home longer than you would have normally,” Sterns said. 
            Sterns also mentioned that other successful charters have taken the same route. The original project wasn’t a complete fail. Sterns says the school  not has the opportunity to save money and tackle the expansion outside the building in a better financial footing.  




Video:
VERY GOOD JOB ON THE VIDEO. INFORMATION IS ADDED TO THE STORY,  RULE OF THIRDS NICELY APPLIED, TODOR IS SOLDLY IN THE LEFT VERTICAL, HEADROOM AND LEADROOM ARE PERFECT. AUDIO IS CLEAR. B-ROLL CORRESPONDS WITH AUDIO. 

           
           

           


           

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