It has been a while since I have written a blog. I missed last months meeting lobbying for the Idaho Dairy Association in Washington DC, and the month before there just wasn't much to write about.
The first thing we discussed was the school calendar for next year. Next school year Memorial Day is later in the month, so it was easier to fit the days in before Memorial Day. After changing things around from the original proposal we seemed to be in agreement on the calendar. It wasn't on the agenda to be approved at the meeting this month, but I suggested we go ahead and approve it. We later voted to accept the calendar. School will start on Monday August 17th. Spud harvest will start September 28th. Christmas break will start on December 23rd. We decided to have an extra day before Easter, which will provide a four day weekend. Graduation and the last day of school will be May 26th.
Mr. Tubbs then went over an update of the Strategic Plan. He went over the balance sheets and told us overall the budget was on track. He talked about all the technology updates that have been done. The bus lane safety issue between the high school and seminary building has been addressed. Phase two of this project will be completed this summer. The sidewalk will be fixed and water brought into the island. There will be a hill built up and grass and trees will be planted. I asked if this was on track to get started early this summer and I was told it was. When finished this will look a lot better.
The teacher leadership premium program is going along well. All certified teachers will have the opportunity to earn a bonus based on leadership incentives the district set up.
There is only about half the adult classroom volunteers as last year, but there are more student, or what they call Cougar Volunteers. They really help in the elementary classrooms, mostly with reading.
Heating and cooling systems in all three buildings were discussed. The high school gym and several units in the middle school have had issues. There are something like 16 units in the middle school all original to the building. They are getting to the end of their life expectancy so having a plan to start replacing them will need to be developed.
They have been gathering information about the elementary boiler and other heating and cooling options for the elementary. Several companies are estimating replacement costs and other repairs. This is supposed to be figured out by next school year.
Computer labs don't look like they will cost as much as was once thought. The computer cost per unit has dropped from about $600 to $300. So this will greatly help reduce the planned computer lab costs.
There were other Strategic Plan issues brought up but I just went over the highlights. It's good they have been working on a plan to better manage what needs done in the district.
The Internet issues that have been in the news recently were discussed. The district is with the same provider as before. We just pay monthly now and have a little less band width. The state is supposed to reimburse us for most of these costs. It's still up in the air as to what will happen for next school year.
We went over several policy updates. One of these updates is about principal evaluations. 33% of their evaluation comes from student achievement. We need to decide what testing we will use to do their evaluation on. We will talk more about this policy in the future. I brought up my concern for this if it's based on SBAC, or the common core test. I think there will be some major problems with this test and how a principal evaluation can be fairly based on it.
I did get a better explanation of how the state controls common core compliance. If we decided we wanted to opt out of the testing, we would lose all federal funds. Among other things we would lose probably 20 staff members. The state also requires 95% of the students to take the SBAC test. If we fall below that we can be declared an underperforming district and the state somehow would step in and run the district. If the SBAC participation is low we would lose some federal funds. I don't understand all the details of this, but they have a lot of control over districts. Madison is rebelling and plans on not complying with the SBAC. They will be a good test to see just how the state responds to them. At some point I think the students will be required to take the SBAC test to graduate. I don't know what will happen to the students who don't want to take this test. I sure hope this gets changed in the future. I have been hearing from my kids how hard the common core math is for my grandkids to learn, and they are still very young. At least one granddaughter used to love math, but now hates it, which isn't a good thing for an elementary student with much more math in her future.
We went into executive session to discuss the district teachers. I think that was about all that was discussed.
I turned in my candidacy papers last week to run for re-election to the school board. If anybody wants to run against me, or for Bart's position you have until Friday to turn your papers in. Unless Bart changes his mind at the last minute he is going to retire from the board. I hope I have done a good enough job to win support for another term. Four years is a long commitment. It is different not having any children attending in the district. I have thought about having a cottage meeting sometime, mostly just to get better informed about what's going on. If anyone has comments or questions please let me know.
Thanks, Brian
