SEPTEMBER 2019 Sandy Springs Dunwoody Brookhaven Buckhead
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STATE GRADES LOCAL PUBLIC SCHOOLS
STANDOUT STUDENT
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SECTION TWO
BUILDS FLIGHT SIMULATOR FOR FLYING CLUB
FALL 2019 | EDUCATION GUIDE
Up for debate
Local schools ride high in speech competitions
Marist School debate coach Jeffery Miller, center, with debate team members Sophie Verska, left, and Will Sjostrom, right, with trophies the team has won. PHOTO BY JOE EARLE
For school districts, is smaller better? BY KATHY DEAN The Sandy Springs advocacy group Citizens for Local Area School Systems (CLASS) is pushing to create its own city school district. According to an April 2019 study commissioned by the group, Sandy Springs’ taxes would generate sufficient funding to operate the 11 public schools within the city’s borders. Sandy Springs schools are part of Fulton County Schools (FCS), the fourth largContinued on page 30
BY JOE EARLE Jeffrey Miller portrays his introduction to high school debate as a happy accident. He signed up for his first debate class at his south metro Atlanta high school because he was looking for something that wouldn’t be too demanding. “I heard it was an easy A,” he joked. But debate turned out to mean a lot more to Miller than just something to fill out his schedule. He was hooked. “I took debate all four years,” he said. “I really caught the fever. It’s all I did in high school.” And it stuck. Now, he’s director of speech and debate at Marist School and coaches the school’s team, which travels the country for competitions in places spread from New York to New Orleans and Florida to Minnesota. Dozens of big silver trophies Marist’s team has collected during his tenContinued on page 26