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4 <br />particularly targeted to support our minority students. These include fully funding the Blue <br />Ribbon Mentor Advocate Program, expanding the AVID program, expanding our volunteer <br />services, and supporting our pre- school programs. A team of educators and community <br />members and students is updating the Blue Ribbon Task Force's recommendations. We <br />can anticipate that the Team will identify the need for additional resources; however, this <br />task may not be completed prior to the submission of the Superintendent's recommended <br />budget. <br />Enhancing the Curriculum <br />A quality curriculum is the foundation for an outstanding school district. Requests <br />have been received for increasing funds for professional development, holding summer <br />workshops to write differentiated units, and conducting a science summer institute to <br />prepare for the adoption next year of new science programs and textbooks. The elementary <br />schools are requesting full funding of their science specialists. At a time when teachers are <br />feeling pressured to focus more on areas of the curriculum assessed by the state, it is <br />important that disciplines such as science not be overlooked. <br />We also would like to expand the international flavor of our curriculum. Chapel Hill <br />High School has expressed interest in affiliating with the International Baccalaureate <br />Program. We also hope to offer Japanese to students at Phillips Middle School and at both <br />of our high schools. We have applied for a grant that does require some matching funds, <br />Reducing Class Size <br />The Board last fall adopted a plan for reducing class size. The first step calls for <br />reducing class size in third grade from 26 to 23. <br />This is not a complete list of the requests. Such a list can be found in later pages in <br />this section. In this memorandum I have attempted to highlight priority areas for your <br />consideration that are consistent with the District's strategic plan. As we face difficult <br />decisions about what to keep in our budget request, I suggest that you prioritize the <br />requests based upon the goals of the district. At the same time, there are some strongly <br />supported requests that do not fit under one of these priority areas that deserve your strong <br />consideration. In some cases, such as the request for a half -time nurse in each elementary <br />school, it is important to establish a consistent level of service in all of our schools. <br />Hopefully, we will leave the planning conference with a sense of the Board's <br />priorities. It also would be helpful for the Board to provide the Administration with some <br />sense of the magnitude of increase that the Board considers to be justifiable in light of these <br />needs. It is not necessary, however, for the Board to be specific about each budget item at <br />this time. <br />