MONTICELLO — Lawrence County School officials want to sharetheir academic excellence with the community and are invitingeveryone to attend staff development seminars this week.

“We want this to be a community effort and community project,not just something for our teachers,” said Roger Smith, staffdevelopment coordinator. “We want to let people know what we’redoing.”

This year’s theme of “Academic Excellence 2000” is reflected inthe sessions’ keynote speakers, Smith said.

Willie Horton, who has been employed with the MississippiDepartment of Economic and Community Development since 1981, willopen the seminar Tuesday. He has served as manager of the Housingand Compliance Division since 1988.

Horton was born in Forest and is a twice decorated Vietnamveteran. He received his Bachelor’s degree from Tougaloo College in1967, his Master’s in public policy and administration from JacksonState University in 1981 and was certified as a community developerat the University of Central Arkansas last year.

Dr. James A. Robertson is scheduled to speak Wednesday from apersonal perspective. He graduated from Liberty High School in 1957and entered Hinds Community College the same year. His educationwas interrupted in 1960 by a serious automobile accident whichblinded him.

After a year of rehabilitation, he continued his education atthe University of Southern Mississippi where he earned both aBachelor’s and Master’s degree. He went on to earn his Ph.D. at theUniversity of Mississippi in 1979.

From 1964 until the late 1980s, he taught government at USM andserved for a term in the Mississippi House of Representatives.While in the legislature, he worked hard on behalf of education.Robertson is now a professor of government at Northeast TexasCommunity College.

“These gentlemen have a particular slant to take on our theme ofacademic excellence,” Smith said. “They have excellentpresentations to share and we want to share their message withanyone who would like to attend. They are outstanding men who havemade a great impact in the educational system.”

Registration and refreshments will be held each day at 8:30 a.m.at the Multipurpose Building on the high school campus. The keynotespeakers will begin their presentations at 9 a.m.

The coordinator said that after the speaker’s presentations,teachers will separate into several smaller sessions designed toteach them more job specific skills. In the two days, Smith said,teachers have the opportunity to attend about 50 of these smaller”breakout” sessions.

The “breakout” sessions are taught by a mix of state departmentofficials, local teachers and several other guest speakers withexperience in certain fields, such as Ronnie Frazier of theMississippi Bureau of Narcotics.

For more information, contact district administrators at587-2506 or Smith at 587-2280.