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J. Larry Newton Elementary credits 3-mill tax and added staff for jump to A grade
Summary
Principal Tanya Harrelson told the Fairhope City Council the school used revenue from the 3-mill referendum to hire instructional staff and specialists; the school’s state report card rose from an 87 (B) to a 92 (A). Harrelson highlighted interventions, ESL support, and a focus on chronic absenteeism.
Tanya Harrelson, principal of J. Larry Newton Elementary School, told the Fairhope City Council on April 8 that the school used revenue from Fairhope’s 3-mill tax referendum to add staff and boost student support, and credited that investment with the school’s jump from an 87 (B) to a 92 (A) on the state report card.
Harrelson said the three-mill funds pay for 11 employees dedicated to direct instruction and student support, including a math coach, a literacy coach, a STEAM teacher, an intervention coordinator, a social worker, five instructional paraprofessionals and several part-time interventionists.
“The principals have it their discretion to request how they're going to spend this money, and for me, I just want to put that in people so that we can spend more time with students and start closing some of those gaps,” Harrelson said. “All students are able to get some intentional targeted instruction based on their individual needs.”
Nut graf: The account to council foregrounds how locally approved property-tax revenue is being used at the school level in Fairhope City to fund personnel rather than one-time purchases, a strategy Harrelson says produced measurable gains on the state accountability measure.
Harrelson described how the school schedules rotation through a STEAM classroom for all students, uses intervention blocks for both students who are behind and those who need more challenge, and has embedded professional development through on-site coaches who observe and support teachers.
She also described nonacademic supports: a social worker who helps families with basic needs and referrals when students face trauma, and two counselors who work alongside the social worker. Harrelson said those roles allow the school to respond immediately to family needs ranging from utility or food assistance to crisis intervention.
Attendance and English-language learners emerged as two continuing challenges. Harrelson told council members that the state’s chronic-absence metric treats any student absent 18 or more days as “chronically absent,” and that the district’s score counts that metric toward the state report card.
“Once they hit 18 or more, they're considered chronically absent,” Harrelson said. “Our kids don't have control over that. They're not driving themselves to school. A lot of parents at the elementary level, if they've got multiple kids, and one of them is sick, mom just keeps everybody home because it's just easier.”
Harrelson said the school is running incentive programs and parent outreach to reduce absences and that she expects some improvement on the next report card. She also described English-as-a-second-language instruction: she said the school has about 63 students identified as ESL out of roughly 800 students and one ESL teacher who pulls groups for immersion-style practice.
On staffing choices, Harrelson said most three-mill funds at Newton are used for personnel; the one recurring nonpersonnel expense she listed was an institutional membership for administrators’ professional development that remains with the school if leadership changes.
Council members congratulated Harrelson on the performance jump and asked follow-up questions about mental-health staffing. Harrelson said Newton currently has two counselors and a social worker and that, for her school’s mix of students, those positions meet current needs; she acknowledged other Fairhope schools, particularly middle and high schools, might need additional mental-health personnel.
Harrelson closed by inviting council members and the public to visit the school: “You are always welcome at Newton. You don't have to call and tell me you're coming. Just show up,” she said.
Ending: The school’s use of local tax funds to hire coaches, paraprofessionals and intervention staff provides a concrete example for the council of how the 3-mill referendum revenue is being channeled into personnel to support day‑to‑day instruction and student supports; Harrelson said she expects continued improvement if attendance and ESL gains hold.
