Superintendent Shares Beliefs, Goals at Board Meeting

New Mehlville School District Superintendent outlined several personal and professional beliefs during the superintendent’s report at the board meeting Thursday.

Knost took over the position when Terry Noble in December; he had previously been the deputy superintendent and principal of Oakville High School.

“Lives change when people come in contact with others that care,” Knost said. “Regardless of decisions we make about budgets, facilities, curriculum and so many other things, a school district’s success relies predominately on supporting this concept of changing lives one at a time through putting students in contact with adults who care.”

Knost said he would work to expand advanced placement and other college credit courses in the high schools. He wants to develop Project Lead the Way, a pre-engineering program in the high schools, and start the program at the middle school level.

“Much of this commitment to technology can be supported by analyzing how we currently spend money in a few areas, especially textbooks,” he said.

Knost also said he wanted to push kids academically, raising the minimum standard of 60 percent.

“Why is it that many students are able to eek out a 60 percent or slightly better just to get by?” he said. “What would happen if we moved that threshold to 70 percent? I contend the vast majority of students would comply with the new threshold and meet the expectation.”

Knost said expanding the district’s alternative programs and creating ninth grade academies would improve retention in the district.

He named performing and visual arts as one of the district’s strengths, saying the programs were among the best in the state.

With facilities, Knost said he didn’t believe state of the art facilities were always necessary and didn’t automatically breed success.

“I do, however, have an interest in taking care of what we have and providing adequately for our academic programs,” he said.

Knost also said he would continue expanding character education and pairing it with high expectations and an individual approach for each child.

“I believe in continuing and expanding our high expectations for student achievement,” he said. “I believe in lifting kids up and pushing them up from the bottom.”