POULSBO — With the first month of 2007 passed, the North Kitsap School District is already looking forward to fall.

Last week, KHS principal Christy Cole and NKHS principal Kathy Prasch announced their preliminary proposals for the course offerings at each school in 2007-2008.

A letter with an attached course list was sent to parents Jan. 26.

“The main reason we got it out (now) is because … we wanted (parents) to see that Kingston High School and North Kitsap High School will be offering very similar programs,” Prasch said.

For now, the courses at each school mirror each other in many ways. However, there are some unique situations — in both personnel and facilities — that could create differences.

For instance, NKHS — situated across the street from the community pool and the Odin Inn student restaurant — will likely feature aquaculture, aquatics and culinary arts curriculum, whereas Kingston would not.

But the Buccaneers — situated next door to the musically inclined Spectrum Community School — are slated to have a recording arts course, whereas North is not.

Additionally, in the foreign language departments, KHS will be the only school offering Japanese I and Russian I while NKHS will be the only school offering French I and German I. However, both schools are expected to have II, III, IV sections of each language for students already on specific tracks.

The course offering proposals — available online at www.nksd.wednet.edu — are meant to give students and parents an idea of what next year’s classes will look like. Both are subject to change in accordance with student interest and staff availability.

“When I wrote my preliminary master schedule, we pretty well knew how many core classes are needed, but the electives are what we don’t know yet,” Prasch said. “I’m allocated a certain number of sections … if I don’t get a certain number of kids for a section, we don’t run it.”

Likewise if there is not a certified teacher available to staff a section, it would not run. Fortunately, the NKSD human resources department has been working for about two years on the district’s staffing needs for 2007-2008, said HR director Chris Willits.

The district is searching for a way to staff both the KHS and NKHS programs with its current employees, Supt. Gene Medina said. Speaking to the idea of hiring additional certified staff, he said, “We’re not opening anything until we’ve lined up that we’ve got a seat for everybody.”

“I can’t guarantee that we won’t come across a spot where we need someone for a position that we can’t fill in-house,” Willits said.

For Prasch, this is the earliest point in the year she has ever had a preliminary master schedule sketched out. Now the schedule should only need minor adjustments as she and Cole direct their efforts toward the task of making the transition as easy possible for all those involved. That means dealing with logistical necessities, student transfer requests and parental anxieties.

“This has been the only game in town, North has,” Prasch said. “I think it’s harder on parents and maybe grandparents than it is on the kids … it’s a culture change.”

With that in mind, she and Cole will be hosting joint community conversations Feb. 13 at NKHS and Feb. 15 at Kingston Junior High. Both sessions begin at 7 p.m.