Rio Rancho High School students and Mid-High students must adhere to a slightly revised student handbook for the upcoming school year.

RRHS principal Richard VonAncken is tweaking the discipline matrix on the consequences side. He told the Rio Rancho Public Schools Board of Education on Monday that the change is to change students’ behavior early.

The board approved the student handbook during its meeting on Monday. VonAncken also said that the handbook includes several safety net features and that the school is adding two counselors as well as a student assistance team.

The primary changes in the Mid-High’s handbook, which the board also approved, is the length of classes.

Classes at the Mid-High will be shortened to 50 minutes, but the number of classes increases to seven.

Students also receive more time to eat lunch, ranging from 40 to 50 minutes. There will be three lunches, running from 10:07 a.m. to 12:44 p.m., except on Wednesday when lunch is served from 10:32 a.m. to 12:54 p.m.

RRMH principal Lisa Dobson told the board that the school had a practice run on the revised schedule on Monday and that things went smoothly.

Another change in the handbook is that students will no longer have to wear their identification card on a lanyard. Students will be able to wear their ID cards on a clip, similar to the high school students.

The revised handbook also addresses electronic devices, such as Blackberrys, DVD players, cell phones, portable video game players and MP3 players.

The handbook states that the use of electronic devices on campus has increased classroom disruptions and resulted in an increase of threatening and inappropriate communications. Therefore, using electronic devices during the school day is prohibited.

Students, however, may possess the items, but they must be turned off and stored in a student’s backpack or purse, locker or vehicle.

Students and teachers may use electronic devises for educational purposes.

Students violating the code will have their electronic device confiscated and may recover them at the end of the school day.

For a second offense, the student’s parent or guardian must retrieve the device.

The school’s athletic board policy also has changed.

Starting in July, all eighth and ninth graders will be designated by the high school they will feed into. Rather than continue to play one blue and one green team, RRMH will move to one Rio Rancho High School and one Cleveland High School team at each grade. This structure begins to address the district’s goals and will provide an opportunity to start building a sense of identity for CHS students and teams.

The change will be done in football, volleyball, basketball, softball, baseball, cheerleading and possibly soccer. All other sports will continue to be unified until the opening of CHS in 2009.

In other action during the board’s meeting on Monday, the board approved federal consolidated applications for bilingual education, Indian education and English Language Acquisition, Language Enhancement and Academic Achievement Act.

The board also approved 11 policies pertaining to Special Education. The act was routine and defines the services provided by the school district, who is eligible and the program’s safeguards.

The board approved Executive Director of Facilities Al Sena’s request for a change order in the MLK Elementary School Cafeteria Expansion Project.

The change order costs $19,251.59 and is to expand the existing Fire Lite fire alarm system and the existing Teradcom intercom system.

New devices will be installed and connected to the existing fire alarm circuits, new intercom speakers and clocks will be installed and a new cabling will be taken to the existing intercom system headend unit.

Crown Builders, of Albuquerque, is the general contractor and the expansion is expected to be complete by October.