Students, teachers receive Christmas gift of privacy

By Chuck Cannon, Fort Polk Guardian staff writerDecember 14, 2009

Students, teachers receive Christmas gift of privacy
Students in Tammy Walters' second grade class at South Polk Elementary School on Fort Polk take a test Dec. 10. Classrooms in the school, built in 1978, are currently separated by partitions or bookshelves. A $2 million renovation project announced b... (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT POLK, La. -- Thanks to the combined efforts of local civic leaders, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and U.S. officials, teachers at South Polk Elementary School will soon be able to instruct their students without interruptions from the class next door.

Vernon Parish School Board Superintendent Jackie Self said the school board would fund a major renovation project for South Polk Elementary School, estimated to cost $2 million.

"The board feels the time is appropriate to renovate South Polk into a more traditional classroom setting," Self said. "This will include walls to create individual classrooms and other renovations as needed to meet the needs of the students at South Polk."

During the 1970s (South Polk was built in 1978), educational "experts" decided that students needed a more "open" learning environment. Large, open rooms were built in school buildings such as South Polk Elementary and later divided by bookshelves to create smaller classrooms. The result might have provided the targeted "open" atmosphere, but it also caused problems as teachers fought to keep their students' attention focused on the lesson at hand instead of what was happening in the class on the other side of the bookcase.

"The original building was designed with no partitions," Self said. "This open classroom concept has gone away."

Self said the addition of walls for each classroom would lead to other renovations at the school.

"We will have to do some modifications based on the information we receive from the state fire marshal and our architect," Self said.

Third grade teacher Kathy Booty called the news of the renovation wonderful.

"The current setup is distracting to children, especially very busy children," she said.

Tiffany Iber, who also teaches third grade, said the addition of walls would cut down on noise.

"That's not a real big problem, but it can be disruptive," Iber said. "It will also be nice to have walls to hang things on."

The work is set to begin as soon as the architect finishes the plans, Self said.

"We'll try to have the least amount of interruptions, but there will be some," he said. "We're not sure at this time how long it will take to complete the renovations because it depends on what we need to do."

Joint Readiness Training Center and Fort Polk Commander Brig. Gen. James Yarbrough called the news "spectacular."

"I commend Jackie Self, superintendent of Vernon Parish Schools, the members of the school board and Governor Jindal for supporting this request," Yarbrough said. "The wall-less classroom was a failed initiative from the liberal-minded 1970s era - it never worked, and the great majority of schools without walls have long since erected walls to provide individual classrooms for enhanced learning. The only reason we still had ours was it seemed too hard to obtain funding - Vernon Parish couldn't spend their funds because the school is on federal property and we couldn't spend federal funds on a Vernon Parish School. We tackled this a year ago believing there had to be a solution - we just had to find it. Through a unified effort by local leaders, our governor and U.S. officials, we're happy to put this one in the 'win' column - a victory for our Army Families - and one more significant fulfillment of the Army Family Covenant."