The New Manchester High School will open in August 2011, fresh with a “cat” mascot name, which is yet to be decided.

“It doesn’t have to be a cat, but we’re leaning in that direction,” Douglas County School Superintendent Don Remillard said Monday. He was the guest speaker at the noon meeting of the Rotary Club of Douglas County.

Remillard said the Board of Education will make the final mascot decision from a pool of suggestions received from the public.

The county’s fifth high school is now under construction at a site on Georgia Highway 166 in the Boundary Waters area in eastern Douglas County.

The new elementary school, Mt. Vernon Elementary, will be ready for occupancy in August 2012, Remillard said. It is being built on Mt. Vernon Road.

He said the design for Mt. Vernon Elementary will be somewhat different than other recent elementary schools since it will be built on a sloping lot.

“This will allow us to have an entrance on both the bottom and top floors,” Remillard said. This will be beneficial since the state will not allow lower grade classrooms on a floor without an entrance, he added.

“For the most part, this will get most students out of trailers (mobile classrooms),” he said.

The Douglas County School System is the 16th largest out of 180 public systems in Georgia. The most current student population is 24,786, Remillard said, with about 200 new students coming in after New Year’s Day.

There are four high schools, eight middle schools and 20 elementary schools.

The school systems operates on a $208 million annual budget with 3,500 full-time employees.

Speaking on the 2010 Georgia General Assembly session which just opened Monday, Remillard said the top three educational legislative priorities can be summed up in three words, “budget, budget, budget.”

He said economic conditions have already forced state educational budget cuts and more are likely coming since state tax revenues continue to be down.

“We may see $300-350 million more cuts, which may mean more furloughs and layoffs,” he said. “Honestly, it doesn’t look good.”

Remillard said he favors privatizing state sales tax collection, which he said Alabama has successfully done. He said the private organizations work on a commission and put more effort into the collection process.

“The state revenue department in understaffed,” he said.

He said other educational issues the legislature will deal with include looking at the recent CRCT (Criterion-Reference Competency Test) cheating scandal and student bullying, including cyber bullying.

Remillard, who will retire on May 31, cited several school system advancements made in the last few years:

• Performance Learning Center (PLC), located in the old child care building on the West Georgia Technical College (WGTC) Douglasville campus, was created with the help of grants from Communities in Schools and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It provides high school training for 75 students who are in danger of dropping out. It has graduated nearly 200 students since opening.

• College and Career Institute (CCI), a joint venture of the school system, WGTC and the business community, provides dual college and high school credits for students interested in vocational training.

• International Baccalaureate (IB) high school program, which Remillard called “one of the most vigorous in the world.” The Douglas County IB program will graduate its first seniors in May.

• Involvement in getting Georgia Highlands College to located a campus here, which will help a lot of students who want to start their higher education at a community college, Remillard said. The college will locate in the old Cub Foods building on Stewart Parkway.

• and Expanded Advanced Placement (AP) course offerings, with students being allowed to take online courses where not enough students are available to form a class.