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‘Ready To Go’

Area School Districts Ready For Students To Return

By Eric Tichy 3 min read

Fresh off summer break, students are set to return to classrooms across Chautauqua County this week. Teachers, aides and other support staff already have returned -- helping to ensure a smooth start to the 2023-23 school year.

"We're excited and prepared for the first day of school and the return of kids," Falconer Superintendent Stephen Penhollow said. "I know our kids will be happy to get back to see their friends and the rest of our Falconer family."

Like Falconer, students return to school in Jamestown on Tuesday.

Dr. Kevin Whitaker, Jamestown Public Schools superintendent, took a moment during last week's school board meeting to offer general safety reminders.

"Make sure that you are watching out for kids and be ready for buses to stop," he said. "Across the summer, if you happened to see a bus, maybe it was out training and didn't do a lot of stopping. Now it's going to do a lot of stopping."

Clymer Superintendent Beth Olson said she felt "really good" about the upcoming school year.

"Everything's out and ready to go," she told Clymer School Board members at their recent meeting. "We are, I feel, the most prepared we have been since I started. We haven't had any of the distractions -- whether it be COVID or the aftermath of COVID. This was really the first summer that I have been able to dedicate specifically to putting a structure together for good instruction, positive culture. I'm really excited for the start of school."

SHARED POSITIONS

Jamestown, Southwestern and Frewsburg will share a transportation supervisor -- John Spacht -- for the 2023-24 school year. Spacht has served as the shared transportation supervisor for Southwestern and Frewsburg since 2021.

Under the agreement, Spacht will split his time between the three school districts, working 40% of the time for Southwestern, 35% for Jamestown and 25% for Frewsburg in any given week. He will help to oversee each district's transportation operations.

"I am pleased to be involved with this partnership with Frewsburg and Southwestern, that enables us to better serve our communities' transportation needs both today and into the future," Whitaker said.

According to JPS, the schools also will share a head bus driver, Roger Bingham Jr., who will be responsible for training and regulation compliance.

Spacht has worked in school transportation since 2010; he previously served as Jamestown Public Schools' head mechanic.

In 2017, he joined Southwestern Central School as transportation supervisor before becoming the shared supervisor with Frewsburg in 2021.

"I am very excited to work with the transportation team at Jamestown again," Spacht said in a statement. "JPS has a group of transportation professionals that are very dedicated to student safety. I look forward to this amazing opportunity to help make the transportation of our children at these three districts safer, more efficient, and cost effective."

Frewsburg and Southwestern school officials welcomed the agreement.

"This shared transportation agreement is a great opportunity to build capacity as we strengthen regional transportation services," said Maureen Donahue, Southwestern superintendent. "At the end of the day, we will maximize resources that ultimately will benefit kids."

"As our county continues to experience a shortage in bus drivers and qualified mechanics, it makes sense to share transportation services," said Shelly O'Boyle, Frewsburg superintendent. "Frewsburg is happy to be part of this arrangement and believes all three districts will benefit from John's vast knowledge and experience."

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