By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

ALABASTER – The Alabaster City School System approved a major step toward updating reading programs at its schools recently, as the city’s Board of Education agreed to spend $241,000 on new reading materials.

During its Feb. 8 meeting, the School Board voted unanimously to approve the expense, which is the second round of new reading materials approved by the system this year.

The reading materials purchased through the program will be used in the city’s two elementary schools: Creek View Elementary and Meadow View Elementary.

ACS acting Coordinator of Curriculum and Instruction Dr. Mark Gray previously said the new reading materials will be in-place in the classrooms by the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year.

The vote came about a month after the School Board agreed to spend $110,000 to purchase a portion of the materials necessary to implement the new reading program.

The school system’s Coordinator of Exceptional Education, Dr. Keri Johnson, said the purchases made last month covered materials to implement an intervention program for students struggling with reading.

“This will cover the biggest chunk of the program,” Gray said after the Feb. 8 School Board meeting.

Gray said the new materials will replace aging reading materials at Creek View Elementary and Meadow View Elementary, and were purchased after gathering input from teachers and administrators and after reviewing test scores.

The new reading materials will be used in the classroom to foster small-group reading exercises, and will replace materials in place at the school for more than a decade.

“There has been a lot of evaluation and hard work that has gone into this,” said School Board member Linda Church. “It’s something that is very needed.”