Laurens County School District 56 is helping all students develop the world-class skills of the Profile of the South Carolina Graduate by providing all students a high-quality education that prepares them for college and career readiness. Laurens District 56 recognizes that "The Experience Matters" for our students, faculty, and staff. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, our school year may have looked different; however, our ultimate goal was the same. Laurens District 56 strived to provide our students the best educational experience we could following all COVID protocols. Our district worked diligently to ensure our parents and students had a choice between face-to-face or virtual instruction. Gear-Up and Preparing College and Career Ready Graduates (EEDA) grants provided tutors and learning opportunities for virtual and face-to-face students at the high school level to meet the academic and social-emotional needs of our students and provide the support the students needed to successfully earn their high school credits. During the summer of 2021, our Gear Up grant has sponsored summer programming at Clinton High School as well as Summer Scholars programs at Clemson University for our rising 10th graders.
Our staff worked diligently to equip students with world-class skills that will serve them upon graduation. The district has provided numerous professional development opportunities to expand personalized learning and inquiry-based lessons into every classroom to increase student engagement and collaboration. The COVID-19 pandemic created the need to create learning environments both virtually and in person. Both environments required teachers, students, and parents to be engaged in a variety of learning experiences. Laurens District 56 has continued its partnership with Michelin to provide students in grades 3 – 6 an opportunity to participate in the LINX program, an inquiry-based learning application of science concepts. ZF Transmissions partnered with the district to support our robotics program for students to have the opportunity to problem-solve and collaborate with their peers as they designed robots to perform specific tasks. Our Clinton High School Academic Team won first place in the 2021 Western Piedmont Education Consortium (WPEC) Division I High School Academic Challenge and Clinton Middle School Academic Team won second place in the 2021 WPEC Division I Middle School Academic Challenge. Laurens District 56's Science Olympiad teams continued their success at the state and national levels. Clinton High School's Science Olympiad team finished 1st in the state and Clinton Middle's Science Olympiad team finished 2nd in the state.
Professional development is essential to ensure our teachers are preparing students to be college and career-ready. Our teachers meet in content area teams to ensure consistency across all grade levels and vertical team alignment. Within our schools, teachers meet weekly to learn best practice strategies and to examine student data on benchmarks to ensure every student has the support needed to meet standards.
In Laurens County School District 56, our goal is to prepare students to become productive citizens upon their graduation by focusing on world-class knowledge, world-class skills, and life and career characteristics. We are very proud of the accomplishments of district students and schools!
Dr. David C. O’Shields, Superintendent
Jim Barton, School Board Chair
