By: CARISSA HEBERT
LSN Editor
The end of the school year for Evangeline Parish went well according to Superintendent Darwan Lazard.
Graduation was successful, and he said three students in the parish earned an associate degree from LSUE.
They received their degree on May 10, which was before their high school diploma, which I thought was very interesting,” Lazard said. This program was made possible through a partnership between the school district and LSUE. He said this was the first year of the partnership. “We had students receive over 800 college credits from our four high schools.”
Lazard said the district started the school year with a launch ceremony and ended it Tuesday, May 28, with a landing ceremony. These ceremonies were ways to recognize the staff. With 750 employees in the district, the outdoor landing ceremony held at Mamou Elementary went well. He said they boiled 3,000 pounds of crawfish and cooked hamburgers for those who couldn’t eat crawfish. Steve Riley provided the entertainment.
“All employees are important,” he said. “This is a great way to show appreciation for all employees. This was our first annual event, and I was very pleased. I’m always grateful to receive the support of the Evangeline Parish School Board. School board members were unanimous in supporting us. A special thanks to the business community in Evangeline Parish and even outside the parish. I can’t forget my staff, because they made it happen.”
The school board is preparing to begin their summer hours next week where they work Monday through Thursday and take off on Fridays.
“We are already planning for the next school year,” he said. “We don’t expect huge changes.”
Lazard believes the parish’s work force is stable. He said this was a year for the “least amounts of requests for transfers or for people leaving our parish to head to other locations. Our work force is settled. Our personnel are satisfied.”
He described education as a cycle. He said they never really stop or pause. Just because students and teachers have left the building, the rest of the staff is preparing for the start of the next school year. And it is really not that far away when they will start another school year in August.
Principals are still at school preparing data for the next school year. He said they will be reviewing bus routes, building maintenance, scheduling students and making sure campuses are presentable for the new school year.
As far as construction projects, there are no major projects starting, but they will be completing projects that began in the school year. He said the final touches to Basile are being completed now.
Programs that will begin are the summer feeding program and an online summer school courses at Ville Platte High.
They are waiting for the outcome of the teacher of the year program because they have a candidate in that contest, Lisa Celestine Jack. He said in mid July, they should find out how Jack does. She represented the middle school division and was an overall winner. He said the state selects three finalists in each category and then names someone the state winner in each category, as well as an overall state winner. He is hoping that announcement will be good news for the parish.
Lazard is grateful for what they have accomplished and hopes the future is even brighter. “We are definitely a team here in Evangeline Parish. I’m grateful to my staff for great work.”