District News

Lakota Local Schools will hire a second assistant superintendent for the 2023-2024 school year, a move that will divide current responsibilities into two areas of focus: operations and student success.

The new position will focus on student success with Robb Vogelmann overseeing operations once a new superintendent is named. The move will not create an additional full-time employee because of internal administrative restructuring.

At its second annual Cyber Showcase, Lakota’s Cyber Academy celebrated the second cohort of students to pass through all three levels of cyber coursework offered at both high schools - and the impressive stack of awards and experiences they accumulated in the process. 

Learning gets “real” when it revolves around a real event and real people. That could be why a gifted math project centered on the Iditarod Race has stood the test of time and continues to pop up in fourth grade math classrooms throughout Lakota.

As the Lakota Board of Education begins the process of finding Lakota's next superintendent, the Board is asking staff, parents, students and community members to participate in this community survey. The survey will remain open until noon on April 28.

Lakota Local Schools has now earned its ninth consecutive Auditor of State Award with Distinction. “Fewer than four percent of all (government) entities that are audited annually earn or are eligible for this award,” said Ryan Holiday, southwest regional liaison for Ohio’s Auditor of State, Keith Faber.

The Lakota District is soliciting community input on the 2024-2025 district calendar. Lakota staff, students, parents and community members are invited to review the current draft before any final recommendation is presented to the school board.

At the April 3, 2023 Lakota Board of Education meeting, Interim Superintendent Robb Vogelmann announced that he will be returning to his former assistant superintendent position following the Board’s hiring of a new superintendent. 

At its special meeting on March 27, 2023, members of the Lakota Board of Education approved one change to policy 0169.1, public participation at board meetings in a 4-1 vote.

In lieu of the traditional 30-minute public comment sessions, the Board will now hold 45-minute community listening sessions prior to regular board meetings.

We invite our community to join us on Tuesday, April 25 at 7 p.m. as we celebrate the Lakota East and Lakota West Class of 2023 seniors who have made a commitment to enter a branch of service after graduation. In addition to the traditional in-person ceremony open to the public, the district will live stream the program on West Chester Township’s YouTube channel and host a week-long military family spirit week in all Lakota schools. 

In response to the Lakota Board of Education’s vote to approve an internal curriculum audit, Interim Executive Director of Curriculum and Instruction Lori Brown presented the Community Curriculum Advisory Team (CCAT) at the March 27 special school board meeting.

“(The Community Curriculum Advisory Team) is going to serve as an advisory group to the curriculum team,” Brown explained to the Board. “We’re going to look at identifying concerns within the curriculum, look at our timetable for reviewing curriculum within the (team)…and bringing those updates back to the Board.”

April is the “Month of the Military Child.” As a way of lifting up all our military families, Lakota is proud to announce a district-wide “Military Family Spirit Week” April 24 through April 28.  
 

On March 9, Lakota School Board President Lynda O’Connor received the 2023 Ohio School Boards Association (OSBA) Service Award.

A new student leadership team at Lakota East High School makes its every move with one goal in mind: to create a welcoming and healthy school culture. For months, the student leaders have been building out a concept they've coined NEST. Short for Navigate, Empower, Support and Thrive - NEST reflects the group's highest priorities. The group will debut months of planning in a week-long kick-off campaign this week. 

The Lakota community welcomed America’s newest citizens at the region’s most recent Naturalization Ceremony hosted by Lakota East High School on March 14. 

Before a gymnasium packed with students, teachers, administrators, local and state dignitaries, and representatives of the United States District Court Southern District of Ohio, 71 candidates for naturalization - representing 37 different birth countries - took the “Oath of Allegiance.” The ceremony was planned and hosted by the Lakota East Veteran’s Network, a student-led group promoting military awareness. 

Lakota’s Master Facilities Committee met on March 6, 2023 to begin reviewing possible locations for new buildings that would align with the approved Master Facilities Plan (MFP).

To better accommodate the public in attendance and at the guidance of the Butler County Sheriff’s Office, Lakota Board of Education meetings will be moving to the auditorium at Lakota East Freshman School.

What do you do if you’re a teacher who finds yourself with an open class period at the change in semesters? If you’re Hopewell Junior chorus director Jennifer Akers, you build a new class.

What does life look like after high school?

A new program called Industry Insights is designed to help Lakota students answer that question.

Industry Insights are sessions that introduce new fields to high school students. During each session, a panel of industry experts is on hand to share their experiences, answer questions and then speak one-on-one with students.

At the Feb. 10, 2023 policy committee meeting, members of the Lakota Board of Education reviewed policy 0169.1, public participation at board meetings. Prior to the policy committee meeting, the Board’s community engagement committee met to discuss different approaches to public comment at school board meetings. 

We hope you’ll join us on Thursday, Feb. 23 at 6:30 p.m. at Lakota East High School for a community conversation about our Strategic Plan.

Beginning Feb. 1, Assistant Superintendent Robb Vogelmann will become the district's interim superintendent.

If you’ve ever wondered what kindergartners wonder about, look no further than Liberty ECS teacher Christa MacFarlane’s “Wonder Workshop.” A growing list catalogs her students’ biggest curiosities and then challenges parents and community members to visit their classroom and share their expertise. 

Little by little, the class has been chipping away at their list, becoming experts themselves in such topics as how instruments and magnets work, how smelly markers are made, how to play chess and fish, and even how grass grows. The project is a model of both personalized and real world learning. 

Community members were invited to have a community conversation with the Board about school finances. Here's what they had to say.

Now in her 25^th year at Lakota, Beth Lange incorporates a few traditions into her lessons at West Freshman.

Personalized learning, in its truest form, is best modeled at Lakota Central. Technically the district’s newest high school, it is officially recognized as a virtual school by the Ohio Department of Education. In reality, it merges the concepts and resources of three former Lakota programs - the Academy, the Virtual Learning Option (VLO) and the work study experience formerly known as ACCESS - all under one roof.