District 303 Proposes Changing Richmond Elementary into Davis Intermediate School; Adding Class Time

District 303 officials are pushing forward with a plan to rearrange and combine students at and schools to create two new schools.

Richmond has struggled with meeting Adequate Yearly Progress set by the No Child Left Behind Act and this move would split students at the two schools—those in the second grade and younger going to Davis Primary School while the older students would go to Davis Intermediate School. It also would effectively wipe the slate clean for Richmond's AYP requirements.

In a December article, St. Charles Patch examined the has endured and would continue to face in the coming years.

District Superintendent Donald Schlomann announced the plan to media on Tuesday afternoon.

While the primary school would focus on literacy, intermediate school students would attend class for 40 additional minutes a day. The majority of this additional class time would focus on foreign language learning with the rest devoted to science education through new technology, in addition to the core curriculum for each grade level.

Additional resources, including iPads for each student and teaching staff from a partnership with Northern Illinois University, round out the new components of the initiative.

All of this depends on school board approval; a vote could come as soon as March.

Two presentations are scheduled—the first at 7 p.m. on Wednesday at Davis and the second at 7 p.m. on Thursday at Richmond.

Schlomann said he believed that implementing new instruction would eventually spread to the rest of the district, possibly within three years.

“This is a chance for us to build on what we believe we will take throughout our whole community,” Schlomann said.