The Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools Board of Education authorized four schools to continue with the Restart program during an abbreviated meeting on Tuesday night.
Restart is a reform model for recurring low-performing schools. These schools operate with statutory flexibility on curriculum, hiring practices, and more to address their individual barriers to improvement. Cook Literacy Model School became the district’s first Restart school in 2016, which led to strong academic growth and removal from the state’s low-performing list. Six schools have been added since then, and all have demonstrated similar improvement.
Participating in Restart doesn’t cost schools or districts money, but boards are expected to formally reauthorize their Restart schools every five years. The schools up for reauthorization on Tuesday were Ashley Academy, Forest Park Elementary, Hall-Woodward Elementary, and Kimberley Park Elementary, all of which have met or exceeded achievement and performance expectations during their time with the program.
The board members unanimously voted for reauthorization at these schools and praised the work staff have done through the program to improve the academic experience for their students.
“We’re already seeing good things coming out of these schools,” said Board Member Richard Watts. “We’ll see greater things coming with the Restart model.”
The board rescheduled the rest of their business to a special called meeting. That meeting, as well as the next meetings of the Curriculum and Finance committees, will be held on Thursday, March 5. Agendas will be posted online once available.