The one figure that people kept repeating out of Thursday's Wake County school board economically disadvantaged student performance task force meeting was 35 percent.

As noted in today's article, 35 percent is this year's gain in Algebra I enrollment under the new EVAAS placement guidelines compared to last year's total. There was a 26 percent increase in pre-Algebra enrollment. Overall, the gain for both courses was 30 percent.

"I know this is new for a lot of principals, but I want to really thank all of you for taking on the challenges," said school board member John Tedesco, chairman of the task force at Thursday's meeting. "Because of that we saw measurable gains. You can’t dispute that. A 35 percent increase is impressive."

UPDATE

SEE END OF POST FOR THURSDAY'S POWERPOINT PRESENTATION ON MATH PLACEMENT UPDATE

Here's hoping that kids remember to wash their hands and sneeze into tissues.

As noted in today's article, school officials are urging parents to stress good hygiene to their kids to reduce the possibility of an H1N1 outbreak in school.

To help things along, Wake is among the school systems who are partnering up with health officials to offer free seasonal flu shots to students.

A not so cheerful year for traditional-calendar schools will start tomorrow.

As noted in today's article, students are returning to schools where class sizes will be up and some elective courses have been dropped. Some teachers are still out of a job and supply budgets have been sliced.

"Our parents understand where we are with this economy," said Chip Mack, the new principal of Davis Drive Elementary School.