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Dekalb County Education Coverage

Avondale charter school makes best of its location, circumstances

Several weather-beaten trailers sit tucked away behind the Avondale Pattillo United Methodist Church. At first glance, they look like nothing more than places to hold Sunday school or the occasional meeting. However, during the week those trailers ar...

School system lawyers remain on Heery Mitchell case

DeKalb County Superior Court Judge Clarence Seeliger denied a motion made by attorneys for construction firm Heery/Mitchell to disqualify DeKalb County School System’s (DCSS) legal counsel, King and Spalding, on Oct. 12. “I believe that it is nec...

Knollwood Elementary gets library makeover

Prior to the ribbon cutting, volunteers in red T-shirts ran back and forth, lifting tables and chairs, and touching up last-minute paint jobs to make sure everything in the Knollwood Elementary media center looked perfect. Over the past several days,...

Recent DeKalb County Schools SAT scores show improvement but remain below state average

Recent Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) results from the College Board show most DeKalb County Schools remained relatively stagnant and below the state average in 2011, while Decatur High School scores improved. Approximately 4,144 DeKalb County School...

DeKalb School reaches out to parents to improve student success

Teachers and school staff from the Ronald E. McNair Discovery Learning Academy gathered with parents and community members at the Highlands of East Atlanta apartments in an effort to raise student achievement. Photo by Daniel Beauregard
At first glance, it looked like residents of the Highlands of East Atlanta Apartments were having nothing more than a simple summer block party—the smell of barbecue filled the air and a band played soul music from a makeshift stage. Upon closer in...

Meet the new superintendent: a Q & A session with Dr. Cheryl Atkinson

Recently, education reporter Daniel Beauregard spoke with DeKalb County School System’s new superintendent Dr. Cheryl Atkinson about her new position. What do you enjoy most about being an educator? The ability to positively impact the lives of ch...

Opinions mixed for superintendent finalist

The long search may have ended; the DeKalb County School Board is planning to publicly vote on Aug. 29 to install Dr. Cheryl Atkinson as the new superintendent of DeKalb County Schools. Atkinson has been an educator for nearly three decades and has r...

Cross Keys High offers engineering and IT classes for DeKalb Schools

Engineering teacher Patrick Gunter points to a computer that controls the robotic arms at Cross Keys and holds up a bearing casing to show students.
Students crowded around as teacher Patrick Gunter flipped the switch to an air compressor, which started up with a loud hum. Suddenly, a metal arm on the nearest table began to move. “These are industry standard based machines,” Gunter said. “T...

DeKalb Schools releases preliminary draft of new superintendent contract

The DeKalb County School System released on Aug. 19 the preliminary draft of Dr. Cheryl Atkinson’s employment contract. Atkinson, who has been named the final candidate for superintendent, is currently the superintendent of the Lorain City School S...

DeKalb Schools names final superintendent candidate

Dr. Cheryl Atkinson
The DeKalb County School Board announced that it has selected Dr. Cheryl Atkinson as the final candidate in the system’s long-running superintendent search, but not all members are in favor of her. Atkinson is currently the superintendent of the Lo...

Return to school brings changes

Children crowded off buses and rushed through the front doors of Columbia Middle School on Aug. 8. It was the first day of school and traffic was backed up for miles as cars and buses waited in line to drop off students. This year the DeKalb Cou...

Decatur’s fourth and fifth graders all under one roof

Decatur’s brand new 4/5 Academy at Fifth Avenue will house all of the Decatur school system’s fourth and fifth graders. Photo by Daniel Beauregard
Principal Bruce Roaden, of City Schools of Decatur’s new 4/5 Academy, said that he remembered not too long ago “we were out back turning dirt” and praying that the school would be done on time. The school was finished on time and on Aug. 2 it o...

DeKalb County fails to meet AYP in 2011

The DeKalb County School System has failed to meet Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) this year, according to a report released by the Georgia Department of Education (GDOE). Of the 136 schools in the DeKalb system, 34.6 percent made AYP in 2011. However...

Peachtree Hope pulls charter application

Peachtree Hope Charter School has withdrawn its charter application and more than 600 students will be placed back into the DeKalb County School System. With the first day of school a few weeks away, officials for Peachtree Hope Charter School were e...

DeKalb Schools improvement slower than other systems on CRCT

The DeKalb County School System is one of the lowest performing systems in metro Atlanta in several subjects and other school systems are improving faster than DeKalb’s according to 2011 CRCT results. When compared with other systems such as Atlant...

DeKalb Schools approves cell towers, denies charters

The DeKalb County School Board on July 11 approved an amended contract on to allow T-Mobile to install several cell towers at schools throughout the county. The original proposal from the cellular provider recommended towers at Margaret Harris Center...

Update: Several schools in APS cheating scandal located in DeKalb

An excerpt from the report.
(Corrected from an earlier version) An investigative report found that cheating occurred in several Atlanta Public Schools located in DeKalb County during the administration of the 2009 Criterion-Referenced Competency Test (CRCT). The repo...

DeKalb County School System administrator suspended

An administrator for DeKalb County Schools is being suspended for 10 days for selling a book he wrote to five schools within the DeKalb system, including one where he previously worked. Former Assistant Superintendent Ralph Simpson agreed to the susp...

Decatur kids stay ‘cool’ with summer reading

Children sit and listen to a storyteller talk about different animals from around the world as part of the ‘One World, Many Stories” vacation reading program. Photo by Daniel Beauregard
A hot summer vacation offers plenty for a child to do, they could cool off in a pool or ride their bikes down the street to get an ice cream, but thousands of kids throughout the county have something else in mind. On June 1, the DeKalb County Librar...

Time running out for DeKalb superintendent search

A leak to the press has once again shown that in-fighting on The DeKalb County School Board is making it difficult for members to agree on hiring a new superintendent by its self-imposed deadline of July 1. This past week an unidentified board member...

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