By Eric Curl
“If you’re riding a horse and it dies, get off the horse,” Savannah-Chatham School Board Member Tonia Howard-Hall told her fellow board members and staff during a recent fall retreat.
Howard-Hall was referencing a book and old saying in order to emphasize the need to try new approaches to education, especially with regards to the need to start educating at an earlier age.
Everything they have been discussing essentially comes down to “third grade reading scores at the end of the day,” Howard-Hall said.
Early education is a key priority among the school board’s 2026 legislative priorities, as adopted at their meeting on Wednesday.
Specifically, the board is urging urge legislators to modify age requirements to require school enrollment before first grade.
“The Board supports compulsory enrollment in educational programs beginning with persons at age five years to effectively create a mandatory kindergarten requirement,” the priority states. “The rapid brain development in our youngest learners presents the best opportunity for building a strong educational foundation.”
The board is also once again seeking to extend compulsory attendance from age 16 to 17 to improve graduation rates.
Adoption of the legislative priorities came on the same day the board heard a staff report about declines in third grade reading proficiency.
The district’s third grade reading performance fell short of targets in the 2025 school year, with only 53% of students achieving grade level or above on the GMAS (state assessment), according to a presentation to the board. This represents a 5% decline from the previous year’s 58% and falls 8 percentage points below the district’s target of 61%.
District officials emphasized the critical importance of third grade reading proficiency, reporting that the grade level marks the transition from “learning to read” to “reading to learn.”
Looking ahead, the district is aiming for 65% of third graders to achieve grade level reading by next year.
Click to access Oct.-1-2025-School-Board-Agenda.pdf
On the funding side, the board is pressing for an overhaul of the state’s Quality Basic Education (QBE) formula, which was established in 1985. SCCPSS leaders say the formula no longer reflects today’s costs and leaves the district to cover more than 40 percent of teacher, police, nurse, and staff salaries with local dollars.
They also want flexibility in how school districts spend sales tax revenue from the Educational Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (ESPLOST). Current law restricts ESPLOST to capital projects, but the board is asking lawmakers to allow the money to also fund instructional programs and materials.
The school board is set to discuss the priorities during a legislative breakfast with Chatham County lawmakers on Oct. 30 at Andrea B. Williams Elementary School.
HVAC and Roof Maintenance costs
In other actions Wednesday, the Savannah-Chatham school board approved significant funds for facility improvements, including an almost $5.27 million contract for HVAC replacement at Woodville Tompkins High School.
The board awarded the contract to Savannah-based Mock Plumbing & Mechanical for a comprehensive HVAC replacement project serving the entire high school campus, excluding the recently completed gym addition, which has separate system needs.
The school board also approved a $4.43 million contract with Roof Technology Partners LLC for a roof replacement at Johnson High School.
According to district officials, the current roof has experienced problems since its original installation, and the new roof will resolve ongoing issues with leaks and other structural challenges that have plagued the facility. Installation is scheduled to begin during the summer of 2026 to minimize disruption to the academic calendar.
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TOP POSTS
Since 1985 money has been thrown at the school system in higher and higher amounts with lower and lower outcomes. That’s 40 years of failed results. Children born in 1980 are now parents and sometimes even grandparents. That’s THREE generations of badly educated people who are perpetuating the problem and no amount of money will solve it. The answer is societal change. That won’t happen because it’s not politically correct to point out the problem and even less so to come up with solutions like two parent families, temporary sterilization until HS graduation, and separation of the sexes in classrooms. Also, turning “administrators” and others into teachers might help.