Extending organized sports to students at Oak Glen Middle School was discussed by the Hancock County Board of Education at Monday’s meeting.  Former coach and Board member Larry Shaw has advocated for the inclusion noting that Hancock County is the only county out of West Virginia’s 55 counties that does not make that opportunity available for 6^th, 7^th and 8^th grade students. 

    Director of the Career, Technical and Adult Education and former coach Dan Enich weighed in on the impact of students participating in sports.    Enich said that school attendance is key in a student’s success and that a study found that 98% of students who play sports have increased school attendance.  He also noted that the need to maintain a minimum GPA to remain in sports is a great incentive for students.

    Cost, logistics, available teams to play and the advisability of including 6^th graders in the teams was discussed.  Shaw said 6^th graders often participate for the experience with no expectation to play.  The Board voted to table the matter pending further information.

    A schedule update on the Weir High Softball and Baseball fields was provided by  Thomas Wippenbeck of McKinley Associates.  The request for bids will appear as a legal in the March 29 edition of a local paper with bid meetings to take place March 31 and bid opening to take place prior to the April 25^th Board meeting.  Wippenbeck said the addition of classrooms at New Manchester will be the next project to be addressed.

In other business, the Board:

**Approved the use of a bus for Little Blessing Preschool;

**Approved an Oak Glen High School Science Club;

**Approved Weir High Academic Games for a trip to Knoxville, TN for the National Academic Games Tournament on April 22-23;

**Approved Heather Wood as a chaperone for the trip;

**Accepted the resignation of Lindsey Smith as a countywide substitute teacher;

**Transferred Brandy Smith from Multi-Categorical/Autism, Oak Glen to Multi-Categorical/Autism, JDRIV Career Center;

**Approved Ashley Tharp as an emergency substitute teacher;

**Accepted the resignations of Jennifer Snider, assistant cheering coach, Oak Glen Middle, and Vance Miller, assistant football coach, Weir High;

**Accepted extra-curricular resignations from Morgan Bricker, co-sponsor Student Council, Weir High; Gail Creel, co-sponsor Student Council, Weir High; Brandy Smith, Freshman class sponsor, Oak Glen High;

**Approved Natalie Simich as assistant, Girls’ Track, and George Martich as assistant, Boys’ Track, at Weir High;

**Approved unpaid leave for Christina Scherich;

**Approved an unpaid leave of absence for Linda Nicoles;

**Transferred Laura Palmer from substitute cook, countywide, to substitute aide, countywide and Paul  Griffenberg from substitute custodian, countywide, to custodian II, Weirton Elementary;