The Carrollton Board of Education approved a resolution Tuesday that was called the "last step" of the first phase leading up to facilities growth.

The board last week discussed a few possible options for the growth, with two possibilities being adding a story to two schools or building an offsite school.

Assistant Superintendent Mike Sanders said the resolution is just a formality that is the last step in approving the combination of the recommendation from the state and the system's plan.

The Georgia Department of Education, when looking at the system's projected enrollment for the next five years, suggested an additional 42 classrooms for the system — 25 at the elementary school and 17 at the high school.

Superintendent Dr. Kent Edwards said the resolution will be "guiding us as we strategically go forward."

"We're a bit of an anomaly because while every other system has been losing students, we've been growing significantly," Edwards said. "Which is an exciting challenge — one I'm glad to have."

Edwards said the system has grown by about 450 students in the past three years — what he called "about the number of a good-sized elementary school."

The system reported a substantial increase in student enrollment to the Department of Education in October, with 191 more students attending a school in the city system over last year.

The system’s four schools have a full-time equivalent number of 4,873 for the school year, taken in October. Last year, the system had 4,682 students, meaning a 4 percent increase in the number of students occurred over a year.

Grades seeing particular growth, Edwards said, are the early elementary grades, with classes exceeding 400 students each.

Two of the options mentioned last Thursday were making the elementary and high schools multi-story buildings or building a remote elementary school.

The resolution serves as a final approval of the state's recommendation — which was formulated by an analysis of the system's enrollment numbers and a tour of the facilities — and the system's wishes, which were folded into the resolution.

Sanders called the facility growth an "ever-moving target" since enrollment numbers can change drastically in five years, which is the timespan allotted for each local facilities plan from the state.

Board Chairman Dr. James Pope said the state's plan is "shortsighted" since it does not call for more classrooms at the middle levels.

"It's interesting to me that we've been told that we need to have more classrooms at the elementary school, but not at the middle school and junior high," Pope said. "Where do they think all those elementary students are going to go?"

Sanders said the middle and junior high schools "should be fine" with the growing number of elementary students.

In the meeting's consent agenda, in which the board votes on several items at once, the board approved a contract with Ombudsman Alternative Education Services.

Ombudsman, a national service, will take over the school's alternative program, previously housed at the New Horizons Alternative School facility.

New Horizons started with 75 students several years ago and has shrunk to only 22 students, Edwards said. The superintendent approached the board in November about the possibility of contracting the service out to Ombudsman.

“We’re serving only 25 percent of the number we had when it first started,” Edwards said. “We’re averaging 22 students attending classes for a half-day. At first, there were 75, and they went all day.”

Edwards assured the board that the program is still “very necessary” and that the switch to the Tennessee-based service will not injure the instruction the students have been receiving.

“It’s a testament to the staff that our numbers have decreased that drastically,” the superintendent said.

The program will give the system a savings of about $200,000 in the first few years, Sanders told the board. The same number of staff members will be needed for the new program.

Ombudsman will rent a facility — Edwards said the former Food Lion space on Highway 27 is a possibility — and will retrofit the space so that it becomes a classroom setting.

Students will still be counted in the system’s full-time equivalent numbers and the program can be customized for a certain level of service, making it the right fit for the system’s students.

Also, the board officially approved the 2013-2014 academic calendar, after two drafts were submitted and reviewed by the public.

The board approved the first draft in January, which included the system's fall break falling on Oct. 19-22.

The new, finally approved calendar moved that break to Oct. 11-14, which will allow families to take advantage of the high school football team's open game day on Oct. 11 and go out of town if they so choose.

Also during the board's regular meeting Tuesday:

• Edwards reported on the SPLOST returns received for the month of March, saying the system received $238,333 from local sales tax revenue.

That number represents a $2,000 increase over the previous month, which Edwards said is a good sign.

The superintendent acknowledged that with the new statewide ad valorem tax changes, the SPLOST receipts may be more difficult to predict in the future.

• The board recognized two groups at the system's middle and junior high schools.

First up were "The Silver Builders," a robotics team from Carrollton Middle, who were awarded the "most innovative solution" award last month at a LEGO Robotics Competition, in which the team qualified for national competition.

The team of 10 middle-schoolers will be traveling to St. Louis next month for the competition; if the team wins, LEGO will award $20,000 to the school's STEM program.

The team designed and constructed a device in which a spoon is slowly lowered onto a candle in order to snuff it out. Jeremy Huff, the school's STEM teacher and leader of the team, said the group got the idea for the device after hearing that many houses burn down because candles are left unattended.

Also recognized was the Carrollton Junior High School MathCounts team, which placed first in individual and team competition at the west Georgia regional competition in Warner Robbins last month.

The 10-member team, led by accelerated math teacher Kim Eason, will travel to Georgia Tech on Monday for the state competition, in which students are quizzed with math problems.

• The board approved several personnel actions, including a recommendation from Edwards that Susan Gordy, a sixth grade teacher at CMS, be hired as an assistant principal at the high school.

Gordy was named Teacher of the Year for CMS late last year. Her position, which will task her with overseeing the high school's curriculum, will become effective for the 2013-2014 school year.