Thomas discusses his vision for Enterprise City Schools

New Enterprise City Schools Superintendent Dr. Zel Thomas – who takes over the position officially in July – spoke to the Children’s Policy Council Meeting on June 16 to discuss his vision for the school system. Thomas also sat down with The Sun after the meeting to discuss his goals as superintendent.

Thomas pointed out how important it was that ECS students have someone to relate to in each building and that they find someone they can trust.

“Every kid that’s in one of our buildings should have at least one adult in that building they can relate to, to use as a tool for motivation and excitement and be someone they can trust to encourage them,” Thomas emphasized. “Sometimes the only smiling face that some of our students see every day is in our buildings.

“That’s why when I was a principal I was always out front so I was the first person they saw. If I saw something was off with a young man or woman then I could pull them aside and talk to them and ask them what’s going on. It’s not just the educational aspect we do, we do the societal and the social aspect to teach them how to interact with adults in certain situations.”

Thomas talked about the struggle of getting students in school that don’t want to be there – or that have parents that are unable or unwilling to ensure they come – and said that it starts with building relationships in the community.

“The only way to do that is with relationships,” Thomas said. “We have to have relationships with our students and families to earn their trust and the student’s trust.

“We want to let our kids and our families know we are here to support them. I want to have that family atmosphere at Enterprise City Schools.”

Thomas said that when he arrived at ECS 16 years ago, it was the people that made the school system so much different than others in the state.

“The teachers, the faculty and the people of Enterprise love Enterprise and love Enterprise City Schools,” Thomas said. “Those teachers take great pride and administrators take great pride in the product they produce. We have to make sure that we are fully there providing that (family atmosphere). I’m talking about every person in our faculty.”

Thomas reemphasized to The Sun that establishing that family atmosphere in the school system is one of his primary immediate goals.

“I just really want for us to establish more of a family, cohesive unit where everyone is working together,” Thomas said. “We want everyone to know their spot on the bus and know their role is important. That’s the biggest thing and it’s cultural.

“The custodians need to know they are valued and the lunch room workers, the maintenance guys, the yard guys, everyone needs to know they are a part of the process. It’s not just the teachers or administrators. We all play a role.”

Thomas said that filling in gaps that have been left in students from missed time in school because of the pandemic is another big goal for him.

“We have to look at each individual kid and we do various assessments – particularly at the junior high and elementary level – that provides programs we think can help them and that can help fill in those gaps,” Thomas said. “A lot of those assessments we use will do an evaluation and create a program that focuses on his or her weakness, so that we can work on that and get it to the point where they are proficient.”

ECS is also retaining more teachers this school year than ever before, which is going to help drive class sizes down to help allow teachers to more adequately address individual needs of their students.

Thomas said that class sizes for upper elementary classes typically averaged 21students per teacher and sometimes would get as high as 27 or 28, but ECS will be able to keep that size down to 17 or 18 students per teacher this year.

“That will be big for us,” Thomas said of lowering class sizes. “This year because of ESSER funds and other fund we will be able to keep those numbers down and that will be really good. That’s going to be so great because we have so many kids that weren’t here and some that still have gaps from the previous year when we missed a whole nine weeks. A lot of those kids weren’t able to get the support they needed with virtual learning.”

Thomas also addressed the future name of Enterprise Early Education Center, which will officially become a K-6 elementary school this school year. While Thomas said a new name will likely be discussed in the future it’s not something topping his list of priorities as the new superintendent.

“It just hasn’t been high on my list of priorities right now with everything else going on,” Thomas said. “It’s probably something we should have tackled before now but we may look into it in the future. There will be at least some discussion about (a name change) in the future.”