Education

HILLSVILLE – Carroll County faces a shortage of bus drivers in the public school system and has implemented an incentive program to try to attract new employees. The incentive includes provisions for new drivers and those current drivers who recruit them.

According to Elizabeth Motley, director of human resources for Carroll County Public Schools, the transportation department is shorthanded all the way around. Last year, Motley realized this could be a problem and took steps to come up with a solution.

Four architectural and engineering firms, over the course of two meetings, pitched options for renovating and expanding the existing Galax Elementary School or, in one case, building a new school on property off of Kipling Lane that the school system bought for that purpose.

Attending and evaluating the pitches were members of the Galax School Board and Galax City Council.

Brady White, now a senior at Galax High School, picked creating a wooden sign as a shop project in the school’s Career & Technical Education program during his junior year.

The sign, which bears elements related to firefighting, is his gift to the Galax Volunteer Fire Department. “I’m with the fire department,” said White. “I’m an Explorer. I knew the machine was here [at school], and I wanted to do something with it, and this was the first thing I thought of.

INDEPENDENCE — More than a year after the extent of the Grayson County Public Schools’ budget crisis was revealed, the Grayson County Board of Supervisors has turned over an investigation into the cause of the extreme shortfalls to the Virginia State Police.

The board completed its investigation of the school system’s budget problems on July 27. It included a forensic audit that covered three years of school finances. Some findings have been turned over to state police and commonwealth’s attorney’s office.