Students Interview Possible Teaching Candidates for the 2010-2011 School Year

As I walked in Mr. Buckles’s class the Monday before spring break I was not expecting to hear that Mr. Buckles was being riffed. Mr. Buckles is a second year social studies teacher and usually the teachers who are getting cut are in there first or second year of teaching. A few minutes in to that class we found out that unfortunately he was. A number of Urbana High School teachers are being riffed or let go due to lack of funding.

So why if so many teachers are being riffed are they hiring more teachers? There are different teachers needed in different departments. The English department has two teachers retiring, Mr. Chew and Ms. Cox, and
need teachers to replace them along with other departments. The Social Studies department had to cut down their teachers because of the budget cut.

As the UHS administration is starting to interview candidates for open jobs they have invited UHS students to be on the interview committee with them. UHS students will be able to have an opinion on what teacher will be hired.”We students don’t have voice because we are being censored and this gives us a chance to be heard and not be censored,” said Sophomore Umberto Ravaioli who signed up to be a student representative on the committee.

Students, staff, and administration will all be a part of this team. The administration is looking to hire new teachers for the English department, a French teacher, and some ESL (English as a Second Language) teachers. The interview will all be held this month on April 19 and April 20. Students were able to sign up to be on the committee.

The idea with letting students being able to help with the interview process came up when Dr. Taylor held a student survey. The survey showed that
students felt that they didn’t get an opinion in things that go on in the school. “With this the student will get a voice in what teachers get hired,” said Assistant Principal Greg Johnson