THOMASVILLE, Ga. (WTXL) — Stephan Thompson is the parent of a 4th grader currently in the Thomasville City School System.
After attending numerous board meetings, voicing changes he would like to see made, he's now one of the panelists at a city-wide town hall meeting for Thomasville City and Thomas County school systems.
He hopes to share solutions to problems surrounding leadership, challenging curriculum, and quality teachers.
"Even on the elementary level - from Scott Elementary to Harper Elementary to MacIntyre Park Middle School to Thomasville High School - kids that attend those schools don't have access to the scholar's programs," said Thompson; a Thomasville native.
Thompson said he does not want to move his child out of the city school system but instead wants to make it better.
"I will be actively trying to make sure that the system that she is in, that we're going to participate in, becomes a place and environment that is good for her," said Thompson.
Thompson told ABC 27 that he worries that without changes being made this will affect kids later down the road.
"They're going to result to something where if they don't have the educational tools to create a better life for themselves, they're going to fall into crime, they're going to fall into homelessness," said Thompson.
Thomas County Democratic Party member Earl Williams decided to put the meeting together after the dismissal of former city superintendent Dr. Bryant.
Bryant was fired from his position due to much push-back from the community and talks of low teacher morale.
Williams said this is a non-partisan event and wishes to give everyone the platform to raise those same concerns from before, inviting both school boards to attend the meeting. Williams said regardless of who shows up he plans to move forward with change. Things such as sub-committees that would tackle different issues though this is still in its early stages.
"I will ask people to volunteer for smaller groups and the smaller groups will have different assignments creating kind of a task force to come up with some proposals that we can make to the city and the county school systems," said Williams.
Williams hopes everyone can come to some line of understanding and agree that better schools systems is what's best for all kids involved.
"A good education system equates to good economic prosperity," said Williams.
