Thirty Troy children will have an opportunity to receive preschool instruction at home this school year, this after the Troy Board of Education approved a join HIPPY project with Pike County Schools at its board meeting Monday.

HIPPY, which stands for Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngsters, will see six parent teachers go into homes and help parents prepare their preschoolers for kindergarten.

“It’s really designed to help parents give their children the readiness skills they will need for kindergarten,” said Linda Felton-Smith, superintendent of Troy City Schools.

Each parent teacher will oversee 10 students, with the other 30 students being children from Brundidge.

TCS will fund the program for its first year, but Felton-Smith said she hopes to secure funding for the program for future school years.

“We’ll have to use local funds in the sum of about $50,000 or this first year and we hope to be able to seek grants for the continuation and sustainability of the program going forward,” Felton-Smith said.

Board president Roxie Kitchens said the program could help with encouraging parental involvement in the school system.

“We’ve always wanted more parental involvement, so I really think this will be a plus and be able to get more parents involved,” Kitchens said.

HIPPY is not the only new program coming to TCS for the 2010-11 school year, however.

Through a partnership with East Central Mental Health, counseling services will be provided at TCS campuses by a roving two-person team of counselors.

Also, an additional two-person counseling team will be located at the alternative learning center to provide a day treatment program for some students.

The roving team will have the ability to provide in-home counseling if need be,

“When a student is not in school, we can have a home visit,” Felton-Smith said. “This will really help with our dropout prevention, and we’ll be able to target truancy more effectively through home visits.”

In personnel action, Kelli Knick and Yvette Akridge were hired as teachers at Charles Henderson Middle School.

Harold Carswell’s resignation as special education bus driver was accepted so that he could move to a new position of In-School Suspension aide.

Also, Robin Snyder was hired as the new Charles Henderson High School softball coach.