Plumbers in Knightsville, SC

SUMMERVILLE — Jennifer Klich grew up with Dorchester School District Two. She’s a product of DD2 schools and now teaches Spanish at Ashley Ridge High. All three of her children go to Beech Hill Elementary.

Throughout her time in the district, it would be impossible to not notice how much the district has grown over the years.

“There’s that huge neighborhood down Delemar Highway, and it used to feel like you’re driving out toward the middle of nowhere (to Ashley Ridge High School): ‘Oh look, there’s this random high school here in the woods,’” Klich said. “But now it’s neighborhood after neighborhood after neighborhood.”

Superintendent Shane Robbins, who is finishing up his first year overseeing the district, said DD2 has been able to predict through calculations and analytics that there will be an increase of 14,000 students from 2022 to 2032, ranging anywhere from 1,100 to 1,800 students each year for the next nine years.

With the growth, Klich is starting to worry about how the school district is managing the predicted influx of students in the coming years.

“I don’t think we’re being realistic enough about that,” Klich said. “Nobody’s even seriously talking about a new high school. There are trailers (being used as classrooms) everywhere. We’re just not taking it seriously.”

Ashley Ridge High School is the newest of the three high schools in the district, opening in 2008. Robbins noted that building a new school would take approximately three years.

The district also opened its newest school, East Edisto Middle, last fall, just in time for the 2022-23 school year.

Robbins said he and the board have talked about establishing a long-range planning committee, which would be a joint committee comprising the Dorchester County Council and the school board. He said while he understands the county has a lot on its plate already, the board will need the council’s support on any decision the board makes moving forward.

“We also want to be able to demonstrate that we are exhausting all options to be as fiscally conservative with taxpayer dollars as possible,” Robbins said.

Dorchester County Administrator Jason Ward confirmed that the County Council will meet with the school board. He said the first meeting on June 27 at 12 p.m. — which will be open to the public — will be showing the board a tool the county has used to help project growth based on residential subdivision development.

There will be more joint meetings following the first one, Ward said. These will be ongoing meetings and they will be scheduled periodically.

“We know that a lot of people are attracted to the county because of the quality in the schools,” Ward said. “We don’t want to do anything that would be detrimental in terms of the schools.”

Robbins added that he and the board are also looking at short-term solutions, like bringing in mobile units to be used as classrooms and moving attendance lines, though nothing is set in stone yet. Robbins acknowledged that moving attendance lines wouldn’t make everyone happy, but he’s trying to support the needs of the district as best he can.

He echoed Ward’s assertion that part of the area’s growth is due to the school district’s reputation. According to the 2021-2022 South Carolina Annual State Report Card, DD2 increased its graduation rate to 93.3 percent. It’s the fourth consecutive year of improvement for the district.

“We want to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to maintain that world-class education that we provide our families,” he said.

During the May 22 board meeting, board member Justin Farnsworth said the district has developed to the point where he didn’t know where else they would be able to find land or buy it. Robbins responded by saying there is some property set aside at Summerville development The Ponds — what Robbins considered to be the center of where a lot of the growth is happening — to build a school.

Ward confirmed Robbins’ statement, adding that the county will be following up with him to see what would best fit in that property.

The numbers Robbins showed the board at the May 22 meeting indicated that Fort Dorchester High School and River Oaks Middle School — both in North Charleston — were predicted to have a slight decrease in population, whereas every other school would experience an influx of students.

Robbins said the North Charleston school population numbers are based on how they’re zoned in the district.

“The North Charleston area that feeds into Fort Dorchester … there’s just not a lot of residential growth,” he said. “There are subdivisions that are actually in North Charleston, that are designed to go to Ashley Ridge High School.” Ashley Ridge High School is located on Delemar Highway in Summerville.

“Nobody knew what growth was going to look like 15 years ago in Dorchester County, and so now all that growth is starting to occur,” he added.

Robbins said he’s feeling optimistic about the district’s plans to manage the growth they’ll be experiencing.

“Is it going to be a challenge and a struggle? One hundred percent,” Robbins said. “But I do believe that from my perspective, from the K-12 education sector, the people in this town really care about the quality of schools that they have for their kids. And because of that, I feel very confident that our conversations are going to be productive.”

The droves of people moving to the Lowcountry for the low cost of living and plentiful jobs aren’t coming alone.

Often those workers have families that include young children who will attend public schools. Of the more than 750,000 people who live in the region, about 22 percent are age 18 or younger, according to the Census Bureau.

That growth leaves school systems struggling to keep up as they strive to find funding, space and dozens of teachers to instruct those new students each year.

“Right now, we are trying to basically take inventory of what we have, and trying to find different ways to deal with the growth,” said Berkeley County Senior Associate Superintendent Deon Jackson.

In many cases, districts’ annual growth is enough to fill a new school.

This year, for instance, Berkeley planned for 800 new students, but 1,400 came.

“And Volvo hasn’t moved the first car off of their plant yet,” Jackson said of the carmaker that plans to bring 4,000 new jobs to the county and will roll out its first S60 sedan later this year. “At this rate, there is no doubt in our minds that yes, we are going to need additional schools at some point.”

Dorchester, on the other hand, got an unexpected break this year. After more than a decade of 400 to 1,000 additional students per year, only 149 new students enrolled in that district this year. Officials had planned for 600.

Predictably, the schools near new development are the most overcrowded.

Cane Bay elementary and middle schools near bustling Carnes Crossroads are currently under the biggest strain in Berkeley, and the Philip Simmons schools off Clements Ferry Road are expected to feel a pinch in coming years.

Dorchester 2’s crush is in the Knightsville area on the district’s northeast side, where Reeves Elementary and DuBose Middle share a campus.

“We have a lot of development coming that could impact those schools,” said Dorchester 2 Chief Financial Officer Allyson Duke.

Lack of funding

But those new houses don’t contribute to school districts’ operating budgets.

State law, Act 388, limits the kind of taxes a school district can levy, including a prohibition on taxing homeowner-occupied residential properties for operating expenses.

“They build all these houses, but we don’t benefit from the property taxes from them,” Duke said.

Property tax bills reflect an amount for the school operating budget that is then deducted as a credit.

“There’s still confusion,” Duke said. “A lot of people do not realize that they’re not paying school operating taxes. They see it on their tax bill and don’t look and see that school tax credit at the bottom.”

Funding for capital needs like new buildings or maintaining existing ones has to come from somewhere else, often special obligation bonds.

“What we are trying to do is make sure that we’re utilizing everything that we have to the fullest extent before we start building additional schools,” Jackson said.

Charleston County, which is also growing by about 1,000 students annually, funds its building program through a 1 percent sales tax. The district expects to collect $575 million to fund new school buildings and renovations through the tax, first approved in 2010 and renewed in 2014.

But Berkeley and Dorchester 2 have both turned to homeowners. In 2012, those districts floated “Yes 4 Schools” campaigns with an eye toward easing some of the overcrowding that existed then.

At the time, they said several schools housed hundreds more students than they could comfortably hold and students were being taught in trailers, work rooms and libraries.

Seventy percent of voters in Berkeley approved the ballot measure to fund a $198 million building program that added four new elementary schools and a high school, while Dorchester 2’s $179.9 million campaign to add three elementary schools and a magnet middle school of the arts passed by a 60-40 margin.

The measures added $102 on a $150,000 owner-occupied house in Dorchester County for 20 years. In Berkeley, homeowners paid $60 more on a $150,000 house the first three years, and are now paying $120 annually until 2023, when it goes back to $60 for another decade.

“The referendum was definitely a success,” Duke said. “If we didn’t have these new schools, I don’t know what we would have done.”

End of Yes 4 Schools

Both Berkeley and Dorchester 2 will see the end of their building campaigns this year. In August, Berkeley plans to open Bowens Corner and Foxbank elementary schools, and Dorchester 2 students will move into the new Rollings Middle School of the Arts.

The extra seats have helped some but not enough, officials said.

“We need more schools, that’s all there is to it,” said Duke.

In the 5½ years since the referendums were approved, Berkeley has grown by about 5,000 students to 35,192 this year. Dorchester has gone from 23,245 to 26,240.

“We’ve completed that building program, and the growth is still coming,” Jackson said. “We’ve made our adjustments; however, it’s still not sufficient. When you have a 900-student school opening up at 750 students, it doesn’t leave you much room, not the way that Berkeley County is growing.”

The county is outpacing even the aggressive predictions of a 2015 study by Clemson’s Strom Thurmond Institute that forecast the student population could skyrocket to 55,000 by 2035. That study called for 20 new schools in 20 years.

Moving forward

But aware that taxpayers are still putting money into the 2012 program, officials are doing everything they can to maximize space.

“We are not so certain that a referendum is the only solution,” Jackson said. “We’re working with the county government and working with our Legislature to figure out what’s the best way for Berkeley County to deal with the situation we have.”

The trailers the districts removed from schools a few years ago are now being added back. At DuBose, for instance, six additional units will be added to the 18 already there for next school year.

Dorchester is not yet talking about redrawing attendance lines — always a hot topic — but Berkeley is.

“Where do you move them? To a less overcrowded school?” said District 2 spokeswoman Pat Raynor.

Officials at both districts said they have a commitment not to increase class size, which can be a detriment to learning for students and a stress for teachers.

“Talk to just about any teacher, and they would rather have lower class sizes,” Duke said. “That’s probably more important to most of them than pay, really.”

Berkeley is looking at some unconventional ways to increase capacity, such as using a “college model” of office space or shared spaces in jam-packed high schools instead of assigning teachers to classrooms. That allows each class to be used every class period, in theory increasing capacity by 25 percent.

“We’re trying to use every resource that we have to the fullest before doing something that’s going to cause us to borrow more money,” Jackson said.

Although they aren’t ruling out future referendums, both are aware that they may not get taxpayer support.

“We’re taking a collaborative approach because we are coming out of a building program that drew a lot of attention,” Jackson said. “We are definitely cognizant of that.”

Opposition to Berkeley’s referendum led to a State Law Enforcement Division investigation and guilty pleas on ethics charges from former Superintendent Rodney Thompson and Communcations Director Amy Kovach.

In addition, in the aftermath of the investigation, authorities uncovered a scheme by former Chief Financial Officer Brantley Thomas to embezzle nearly $1 million from the district and shuffle money between accounts to cover up construction cost overruns of about $7.2 million.

Dorchester 2 was also sued over its referendum. In March 2017, Summerville lawyer Mike Rose filed a lawsuit claiming that the district broke state law and its own rules during the building campaign, leading to cost overruns, delays in opening new schools and shoddy work. That lawsuit is ongoing.

SUMMERVILLE, S.C. (WCBD) – It was 1973 when Shirley McGreal, then living in Southeast Asia, saw beady bright eyes staring back at her from between the slats of a wooden crate.

The eyes belonged to a gibbon — a primate native to the region — who had fallen victim to the dangerous world of the pet trade, where gibbons were being sold into homes, zoos, or labs, only to later be discarded.

In 1977, McGreal created the International Primate Protection League (IPPL) in Summerville as a gibbon sanctuary. The now 47-acre property remains nestled in a quiet area of the Lowcountry that is illuminated by the sounds of the primates singing to one another.

Meg McCue-Jones, the Compliance and Outreach Manager, explained that the land was a sod farm in the late 70s and started taking in the gibbons that needed help soon after.

One of the sanctuary’s residents, Gibby, is one of the oldest known living gibbons at over 60 years old.

Like most of the gibbons at the sanctuary, his life started off rough.

McCue-Jones said that Gibby was wild caught, and “with every gibbon wild caught, they shoot mom out of the tree, hoping baby falls, and then they take the baby.”

He was first sold into the pet trade in by a Bangkok dealer, but that was just the beginning. Gibby went to labs at Hofstra University and the State University at Stony Brook.

Researchers embedded electrodes in his skin as part of a locomotion project.

The electrodes and thin wires were inserted into his muscles and connected him to a suit that would measure his muscle movements. McCue-Jones explained that this was obviously not an ideal situation on any aspect, whether it be a human or animal.

At 44, Gibby made it to his first sanctuary, but the conditions were hard on his body. In March of 2007, just four years after his arrival, the IPPL reached out to the sanctuary to relocate not only Gibby, but several other gibbons.

For Gibby, like the other 29 at the sanctuary, Summerville is his last stop. McCue-Jones says that the sanctuary is their forever home.

But with the pandemic, their home has become more difficult to manage.

With fear of COVID-19 spreading to the primates, volunteers were no longer allowed to assist with the many daily tasks necessary to keep the place running.

From hosing the outsides of the enclosures, to raking, food prep, and even assistance inside the office—the staff was left with mounting responsibilities.

The economic impacts of the pandemic left donors and community partners reeling financially, but the bills at the sanctuary remained steady.

As a non-federally funded organization, the IPPL relies heavily on donations to meet the needs of the animals.

Stacy Lambert, a Senior Animal Care Giver, said that since a lot of their population has started to reach geriatric ages, their vet bills are getting bigger as they are having more interventions and medications, different procedures, and checkup appointments with Dr. John Ohlandt.

While expensive, their system of care has proven to work.

Lambert says that in the wild, gibbons usually live about 30-35 years. However, in captivity, gibbons living into their 40s is normal. However, the IPPL has quite a few gibbons that are up in their 40s and 50s while, of course, Gibby is 62.

Although the interventions from the IPPL show the ability of the sanctuary, McCue-Jones said all those at the IPPL ultimately wish there was not a need for them at all, and that the gibbons could live freely in the wild.

McCue-Jones said, “as Shirley has spoken of before, if you really think about it, do humans need sanctuaries, should we have them? Should we be treating the animals this way?”

To send the Gibbons a care package full of nuts, click here.

To donate to the IPPL’s missions and day-to-day operations, click here.

To send specified items needed by the IPPL via Amazon, click here.

By Casey L. Taylor, JD

Tucked away near Summerville, SC – the place known as “Flowertown, USA” – is a sanctuary dedicated to gibbons (small apes). It’s a jungle-like wonderland that has lifesaving at the core of its mission.

The International Primate Protection League (IPPL) sanctuary is a secret to many locals. It is situated on over 40 acres of land surrounded by lush woods. Neighbors are lucky enough to hear the songs and great calls of these interesting primates throughout the day and night.

The sanctuary is home to 36 gibbons, the smallest of the apes, who have been rescued or retired from laboratories, deplorable “roadside” attractions, or the pet trade. IPPL provides lifetime care to these incredible endangered species and works to educate the community on the plight of gibbons in the wild.

The gibbon residents at the sanctuary have indoor night houses that are hurricane-grade, expansive outdoor habitats, and aerial walkways that give them the choice to safely move about their designated areas as they wish. It is important to the organization that each sanctuary resident is given as much freedom of choice as possible in a captive environment, while keeping them safe. Despite most residents having a rough start to their lives, they thrive at IPPL. They even have some residents nearing the age of 60!

International Outreach

IPPL is a grassroots nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting and preserving the world’s remaining primates, great and small. For the last 45 years, IPPL has made a global impact by securing an export ban on primates from Thailand (saving thousands and thousands of lives) and working with over 20 reputable primate rescue and rehabilitation centers in Southeast Asia, Africa, and South America.

IPPL not only supports their efforts to care for native primates who have been rescued and are in need of rehabilitation or lifetime care, but also to thwart poachers and illegal wildlife traffickers, as well as educate local villages and communities on how they can help be part of the solution in preserving native populations of primates.

Small Team, Big Impact

With a small but mighty team of animal caregivers, maintenance technicians, office staff, and dog nannies, IPPL provides compassionate lifetime care for every resident, which includes nutritious and delicious fresh produce three times a day for the gibbons, as well as veterinary care and enrichment — to stimulate those intelligent minds of theirs!

Forms of enrichment vary from food puzzles that the gibbon must figure out in order to get their healthy treats, to special time with their favorite caregiver. Bubble-blowing is a big hit with some of the gibbons. Tong, who was one of the first four original residents at the sanctuary, loves a good foot rub — what girl doesn’t?

Absolutely nothing beats a life in the wild, but for these residents that is sadly not a reality. The team at IPPL feels that the least they can do is make the rest of these individuals’ lives the happiest and healthiest they can be. From residents used in invasive human vaccination studies and locomotion tests, to those kept in less-than-favorable conditions, IPPL’s sanctuary is a safe and loving place for them to thrive and to live as gibbons should.

Casey L. Taylor, JD is the Executive Director of IPPL.

MORE ABOUT IPPL

The sanctuary is not open to the public as an attraction, but it holds educational events in the community and offers options to visit during special times. Sign up to receive their e-newsletters on their website (www.ippl.org) and be the first to know about opportunities and events.

DORCHESTER COUNTY, SC (WCSC) - The Dorchester District 2 School Board announced who will take the helm at the three new elementary schools next school year.

Vernisa Bodison will be the principal for the new Alston-Bailey Elementary School. She is currently the principal at Windsor Hill.

Dr. Eugene Sires Elementary School will be led by Laura Blanchard who is currently the principal at William Reeves Elementary.

Dr. Wally Baird will take on the new Sand Hill Elementary School. He is at Knightsville Elementary right now.

The old schools will see some familiar faces as their new principals as some assistant principals will be stepping up in those leadership roles.

A full list of administrative teams can be found below.

Dorchester School District Two has announced the administrative teams of the three new elementary schools opening in the fall of 2016, along with other elementary school administrative changes. The following administrators were named to take the helm at the three new elementary schools beginning with 2016-2017:

Alston-Bailey Elementary School

Vernisa Bodison—Principal, is currently principal at Windsor Hill Arts Infused Elementary

Assistant Principal—to be announced

Dr. Eugene Sires Elementary School

Laura Blanchard—Principal, is currently principal at William M. Reeves, Jr. Elementary

Dan Farmer—Assistant Principal, is currently assistant principal at Fort Dorchester Elementary

Sand Hill Elementary School

Dr. Wally Baird—Principal, is currently principal at Knightsville Elementary

Annette Roper—Assistant Principal, is currently assistant principal at Knightsville Elementary

The following are additional administrative changes for elementary schools beginning with 2016-2017:

Knightsville Elementary School

Claire Sieber—Principal, is currently assistant principal at Knightsville Elementary

Carey Hodge—Assistant Principal (no change)

William M. Reeves, Jr. Elementary School

Natalie Hayes—Principal, is currently assistant principal at William M. Reeves, Jr. Elementary

Michelle Nicholson—Assistant Principal (no change)

Windsor Hill Arts Infused Elementary School

Robert Neuner—Principal, is currently assistant principal at Gregg Middle

Katie Barker—Assistant Principal (no change)

Fort Dorchester Elementary School

Harolyn Hess—Principal (no change)

Gwyn Brock—Assistant Principal (no change)

Rachel Mahaffey—Assistant Principal, is currently assistant principal at Flowertown Elementary

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