Education

Keep up with Columbia public schools

Below the overview of the district are links to KBIA's coverage of Columbia 93 district schools, updated as more stories are published. Columbia 93 at a glanceThe Columbia 93 school district currently includes 32 different schools. In 2014, the district had a k-12 enrollment of 17,204 students, which is 2% of the total k-12 enrollment for the state. Enrollment has been slightly increasing in recent years, 2% since 2011. While a small percent, that amounts to almost 400 more students. There have also been major re-drawing of attendance areas with the addition of Battle High School. Middle school attendance areas shape high school boundaries 00000178-cc7d-da8b-a77d-ec7d2f9e0000The changes have affected all schools in the district, including causing high school attendance to increase and overcrowding at one middle school at least.

Columbia school board candidates discuss goals at open forum

KBIA | By Lauren Dunn

Published March 10, 2014 at 8:54 AM CDT

Columbia school board candidates Joseph Toepke, Jonathan Sessions, Paul Cushing and Helen Wade participated Friday in a forum hosted by Muleskinners.

Candidates fielded questions from community members and discussed their goals if elected to the Columbia Public School district’s board.

Columbia resident Marion Mace Dickerson attended the event.

"You really can't tell much about the candidate until you have a chance to hear what they have to say, hear what their answers are to the questions," Dickerson said.

A variety of issues were covered. The candidates discussed the inclusion of more foreign language classes, bullying prevention and the Common Core program that will begin in fall of 2014.

Current school board member Jonathon Sessions is running for reelection. He says Columbia schools have started adapting to meet the common core standards.

"But the Columbia Public Schools, knowing that this was something our state was planning on adopting, we started adopting curriculum that will help our students meet those goals," Sessions said. "We got to choose the curriculum that helped meet the Common Core standards."

The election will take place April 8, with three positions open.