By ANDY GARDNER

MASSENA — The Board of Education on Thursday took a step to assist several students who do not speak English at home and need help learning the language.

Superintendent Patrick Brady told the board that they have 10 students right now not speaking English at home, and testing revealed three of them need extra help.

So the board during their personnel actions hired ESL teacher Grace Schenker at $30.85 per hour for on site teaching and $15.43 for distance learning. She will provide an hour of instruction per day three days per week.

Brady said state law requires they provide the service to those students.

He said they will use Schenker in conjunction with a foreign language teacher who is certified in that area but not ESL.

He said the only alternative was to bus the kids on an hour bus ride to Lisbon Central, which he did not think was a good choice. They have a certified teacher and offered to help the students.

“We felt that for the students, that was the best option that was on the table was to create a hybrid service,” Brady said. “I met one of them and I said ‘I can’t put that child on the bus for an hour’ … it isn’t totally clean but I think it was the best we can do under the circumstances.”