Henryetta school board members unanimously supported the April 2 statewide teacher walkout Monday night with a resolution.
“We have all seen the news about lack of funding for schools and teacher’s pay. I feel it is important the school board show solidarity,” said superintendent Dwayne Noble.
With the length of time the walkout could last, board members expressed concern over scheduled school activities including the prom set April 7 as well as graduation and sporting events.
Noble said the school still has six snow days built into the calendar. “Once those six days are exhausted, we will have to make it up. I hope things will be resolved and we don’t have to extend the year.”
Alan Montgomery, Henryetta Education Association vice-president, said issues in rescheduling state tournaments would be a nightmare. “All kinds of different things are scheduled a year in advance, hotel rooms, airline tickets for judges,” he said. “There was a comment made that this may be the year that state tournaments don’t exist because we ran out of time. This is a horrible, horrible situation that has been building for a number of years. Unfortunately the students will be the ones paying for it.”
He called the impasse over state funding for education a “bad situation. I hate it for the kids. Sometimes you have to take a step back to move forward.”
He went on to encourage teachers to use the time during the walkout to go to the state Capitol and, “make your presence known. We have to have as many teachers there as we can so legislators see us and we are disrupting their schedule.”
One issue worrying school officials is providing meals for children who would otherwise do without.
Christle Wells said the Henryetta and Dewar First Baptist churches are working with Feed the Children to supply that need. “We are trying to figure out if the kids need to come to the churches or someplace else,” she said.
Board member and retired teacher Jeannie Duncan made the motion to pass the resolution.
A special meeting  is going to be held following spring break to discuss the latest developments in the school funding issue. No date was set for that meeting.
It was announced a public meeting including teachers, parents and people from the community will be held March 14 at the high school cafeteria from 4 to 5 p.m.