http://www.heraldsun.com/state/6-625680.html

Spanish pilot program being expanded Miss. school district
Jul 12, 2005 : 9:29 am ET

HERNANDO, Miss. -- A pilot program that teaches Spanish to students at five DeSoto County elementary schools will be expanded this upcoming school year.

DeSoto County officials said 11 schools will be added to the program that uses a teleconferencing system.

Martha McIntosh, director of management information systems for the school district, said the district hopes to hire three additional Spanish teachers within the month to help implement the expanded program.

"All 11 of the new schools in the program will be operational at the end of this month," McIntosh said.

She and other school officials met with Leonard Salley, president of VisiCom Corp., last week. VisiCom is headquartered in Stone Mountain, Ga., and has statewide video conferencing contracts in North Carolina, South Carolina and Mississippi.

Tina Streeter, distance learning coordinator for the district, said about 200 students in kindergarten through fifth grade were taught last year by teacher Kristi Burns.

Burns said adding 11 new schools to the program will cost about $143,000. Hiring teachers for those classes would cost the district more than $600,000 in salaries alone.

------

------

Information from: DeSoto Times Today, http://www.desototimes.com