LPSB resumes on-campus meetings with Dubach tour

The Lincoln Parish School Board has resumed its pre-COVID practice of holding some board meetings on-site at schools throughout the district.

Board members took a tour of Dubach Elementary School Tuesday before holding its meeting in the school’s gym — the first board meeting on a school campus since before the pandemic’s onset in 2020.

“It’s good to get involved and see everything they’re offering the students,” board President Joe Mitcham said.

Accompanied by Principal Tiffany Curry, a group of select fifth graders served as the board’s tour guides, pointing out everything from science and art projects to the school gardens and areas dedicated to the new Boys and Girls Club program.

Then community members and staff gathered in the bleachers as the board held its regular October meeting on the gym floor.

It wasn’t lost on some that in 2019, that same gym had been the site of a community meeting with the school district administration that resulted in Dubach Elementary School narrowly avoiding closure.

Now the school is seeing the parish’s highest growth rates on test scores, and parents at Tuesday’s meeting heaped praise on Curry’s administration.

She said bringing the board members on-site is crucial to spreading the word of the school’s progress.

“This town and these students deserve their own school,” Curry said. “And sometimes people just go on what they’ve heard, and not what they know. To have the board members here and seeing for themselves what an amazing space we have, what great opportunities we provide our students, our families, this town and this community — I’ve been waiting for this.”

Superintendent Ricky Durrett said the plan is to continue the pre-COVID practice of gradually making a circuit through all parish schools, holding a board meeting at one about once every quarter, unless the board wants to do it more often than that.

“This is really important that they can get into schools, see what’s going on, see the facilities,” he said. “Try to create a connection so it’s not just a board that meets and doesn’t see the schools.”

As the meeting adjourned, board member Donna Doss, who represents the Dubach district and is a former principal of Dubach High School, was all smiles.

“This was an opportunity for me to show off my home, my house,” she said. “This was an opportunity for us to shine. Great things happen at Dubach.”