Columnist Sandra Thompson: Principal is making strides at older school

Sandra Thompson is vice president/associate editor of the Las Vegas Sun. Reach her at 259-4025 or through e-mail at [email protected]

WHEN CAROL LARK sought a new assignment as principal, she traded comfort for challenge.

Lark served seven years as principal of Kahre Elementary School, three blocks from her northwest Las Vegas home.

Terrific support from staff and the PTA there made for little challenges at the school. Indeed, she says things ran so smoothly that her job turned into a "calendar keeper."

Lark told district administrators that when it came time to move her, she wanted an at-risk school, preferably in a predominantly Hispanic area since she speaks Spanish.

Last year she became principal of C.P. Squires School in North Las Vegas. The 40-year-old school was badly in need of renovation and paint. Test scores were nothing to brag about. Many students didn't speak English.

But Lark is used to navigating new trails. One of 13 children who was raised on a farm, Lark joined the Peace Corps at 19. She lived in an Indian village in Ecuador.

So she was drawn to the Squires challenge. When a friend learned she was moving from a beautiful, newer school to C.P. Squires, she was told: "You'll wake up."

"One of us will," she replied.

Luckily for C.P. Squires students, Lark is opening others' eyes by creating a solid education foundation and a comfortable environment in which students can learn and thrive.

"She's an educator who is dedicated to developing an environment and curriculum that create success," a spokesman for the Kahre PTA said of Lark.

Through a very successful and close partnership with Texas Station hotel-casino, the grounds of the sprawling Squires campus is being transformed. Landscaping, rocks, boulders, trees and bushes, underwritten by or donated by Texas Station, replaced the drab dirt.

"I came from a PTA that had $55,000 to a place that had a zero balance," Lark says. So she's especially grateful to Texas Station's commitment to Squires.

As part of the School Bond issue, Squires was in line for rehab work. It wasn't as extensive as Lark had hoped. Classrooms and the school's exterior were painted, but not the rusty, peeling awnings over the hallways outside the classrooms.

That won't do, Lark thought. She called and called and called the school district until someone authorized the work. The rotting awnings were replaced.

Lark also took aim at the students' test scores.

"The test scores made me angry. I lived in a Latin culture. I knew the children were intelligent," she says.

She recruited and developed an enthusiastic and motivated teaching staff. The key, she says, is keeping master teachers. She also pairs up new teachers with more experienced mentors.

Using Title I federal funds, Lark started a program to raise the students' proficiency. Light Span teaches language, math and reading skills in a video game format. The school has about 250 Sony stations it signs out to parents of students in second and third grades. The lessons are on CDs, which the students put on the Sony stations. They come with controls -- just like a video game -- and accountability worksheets the students must fill out.

Lark explains the Light Span program in Spanish to parents, encouraging them to participate in the exercises.

She says it will be two to three years before the impact of the program can be measured. Five other schools are using Light Span.

The mood at Squires, a year-round school, is upbeat. Students greet Lark with broad grins as she shows a visitor around campus and proudly points to the new landscaping.

Squires' classrooms are larger than those in new schools. Two teachers oversee 32 or 34 students. Children work in centers in same-ability groups for reinforcement of skills, she says.

As C.P. Squires celebrates its 40th anniversary in September, it has much to be proud of. And that makes Lark smile.

"This is the most pleasure I've had on a job assignment in twentysome years," she says.

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