There seems to be confusion in how to go about trying to solve concerns some people may have. I want to try and address this here without pointing any fingers at anyone. When your child has some kind of an issue at school that you may need resolved, the first step is to go to the teacher and discuss it with him or her. If it can not be taken care of this way or at least to your satisfaction then you need to go to the building principal. I would hope that in most cases the principal can properly take care of whatever problem your child may have. But if things are still not resolved then contact Mr. Tubbs. He is the administrator over the principals, all the teachers and other staff. It is his job to make sure school policies were properly followed. If you still feel like your issue isn't resolved then you can bring it to the attention of your board member, or I would think any board member you would feel most comfortable discussing the issue with. Your board member will then most likey ask you if you have followed these steps as I just described, and may have further recommendations for you to follow.
It is very important to follow these steps for many reasons. The teacher knows your child better than anyone at the school, so they should know best how to deal with whatever concern you have. I would think the level of knowledge about the student decreases at each level. But this is also why we have policies, so for many issues the school administrators can refer to what is written in our policy manual. We as board members are cautioned not to get too involved with most issues. If there is say a suspension or other punishment given the student has the right to appeal to the board. We should try to stay unbiased so if there is an appeal, we can then hear the facts from all sides, and then as a board issue what I hope would be a fair judgement of the situation. Knowing too much before this would make it more difficult, and perhaps a board member may need to recuse themself by knowing too much.
I know it may be tempting to go right to your board member and expect that board member to solve you problem right away. It is also important to know an individual board member has no authority to take action by themselves. We are a board of five, and there has to be a majority to make any decision. I personally know very few of your children or even very many of the teachers. It is very hard for me to make a fair judgement of the situation. But saying this doesn't mean I think issues should go unresolved. There have been times when a parent talks to a board member about an issue they want delt with, but will indicate they don't want their name used. This is also a very hard situation to deal with. It's not fair to the teacher or administrator to be blamed for a situation that they may have no way of defending themselves over. I have also heard some teachers or aides may be afraid to openly express a concern they may see at the school over fear of being fired. I really don't think this would happen. If ever a teacher or anyone were to feel like their job was in jeopardy over speaking up on anything, as long as their concerns are honest and valid, I would like to know. I could just add from my other board experiences, I have experienced this situation myself and I won't except it at our school.
I would also like to ask for your help. There are some issues with discipline at the school that are very hard for the teachers and administrators to deal with. Please make sure your children of all ages are following the dress code, and for those who have cell phones please talk to them about when to use them. We have new policies addressing both of these issues. I have also heard there is a lack of respect given to some teachers and others. The halls are filled with crude and vulgar language at times. I hope there is a way for this behavior to change.
So to summarize if you have a problem, please follow these steps. Please don't just complain about something without trying to do what you can to solve your issue. It isn't an easy job to be a teacher or administrator, and our budget limitations putting more responsibilities on our administrators make it more difficult also. I hope I didn't offend anyone writing this. I just hope you better understand how to follow proper procedures. Thank you. Brian
Friday, March 29, 2013
Saturday, March 23, 2013
March 21st Cottage Meeting
April and I held a cottage meeting in the high school library Thursday. There were probably about twenty in attendance with some coming late and leaving early.
There was a concern brought up about the area between the high school and seminary building. The students park all over and all different directions. It is a safety hazard with students walking to the seminary building and to get on the buses. Students have come very close to getting hit by speeding cars. We have talked about it as a board and plan on addressing it this summer. We will probably make a bussing lane either in front of the school or to the side with cement barriers. We plan on taking out the trees and putting a barrier across the road coming down I think it's center street, to divert traffic from driving along the east side of the school. The city is going to do major work on this road and we will tie into it somehow.
We talked about the security camera system that was recently updated in the high school. We also talked about the idea of updating and putting in security cameras in both other buildings. I later found out that the cost to do this is estimated to be about $10,000. If we choose to we could pay for this out of our student occupied funds, the same way we funded the bleachers. I think having the added security would be a good idea. The cost of this has come down from what it used to be. Currently wireless Internet is getting installed in the buildings. There is concern with items being stolen from the middle school students.
I mentioned that after looking at the elementary during our walk through that we are going to get a bid to see what the cost would be for weather doorways to be added in the three entrances that don't have them. The wind was blowing that day, blowing in a lot of cold air and the moving back and forth could pinch fingers.
It was suggested that we work on a strategic plan to set priorities. I take the blame for this. Our committee was supposed to go over this but since we haven't had a meeting in a long time we haven't done this yet, but plan too.
There was some discipline concerns brought to us that were talked about at length. I don't feel like its appropriate to discuss it here. There was also some personnel issues brought up that I won't mention either. These type of concerns need to be addressed through proper channels.
There is concerns about how the aides are used in the elementary. When aides are absent they don't have anyone come in and replace them, they just try and move them around the best they can to where they are needed most. When aides are not in the scheduled room to help, it puts a burden on the teachers. I think we need more aides but having more would not be supported by any outside funding. I think this is something we need to talk about during our strategic planning.
There is concern about the dress code and cell phone use. These rules are hard to enforce. It would help if parents would help by making sure their kids are dressed appropriately. Cell phone use in class is a problem that would also help if parents would talk to their kids about using them only at the appropriate time. Some students don't show proper respect for others and their teachers. It's very hard for the school to deal with students that don't show proper respect. These issues need improvement, but parents need to do their part to help.
The school website needs work. The policies are not on the website yet. I think this will be worked on in the near future. Thanks for all who attended. My wife made some good treats you missed by not coming. As a board member I can't solve everyone's problems to their satisfaction, but I will listen and do what I can. I always respond to school emails. Feel free to let me know your concerns. Thanks, Brian
There was a concern brought up about the area between the high school and seminary building. The students park all over and all different directions. It is a safety hazard with students walking to the seminary building and to get on the buses. Students have come very close to getting hit by speeding cars. We have talked about it as a board and plan on addressing it this summer. We will probably make a bussing lane either in front of the school or to the side with cement barriers. We plan on taking out the trees and putting a barrier across the road coming down I think it's center street, to divert traffic from driving along the east side of the school. The city is going to do major work on this road and we will tie into it somehow.
We talked about the security camera system that was recently updated in the high school. We also talked about the idea of updating and putting in security cameras in both other buildings. I later found out that the cost to do this is estimated to be about $10,000. If we choose to we could pay for this out of our student occupied funds, the same way we funded the bleachers. I think having the added security would be a good idea. The cost of this has come down from what it used to be. Currently wireless Internet is getting installed in the buildings. There is concern with items being stolen from the middle school students.
I mentioned that after looking at the elementary during our walk through that we are going to get a bid to see what the cost would be for weather doorways to be added in the three entrances that don't have them. The wind was blowing that day, blowing in a lot of cold air and the moving back and forth could pinch fingers.
It was suggested that we work on a strategic plan to set priorities. I take the blame for this. Our committee was supposed to go over this but since we haven't had a meeting in a long time we haven't done this yet, but plan too.
There was some discipline concerns brought to us that were talked about at length. I don't feel like its appropriate to discuss it here. There was also some personnel issues brought up that I won't mention either. These type of concerns need to be addressed through proper channels.
There is concerns about how the aides are used in the elementary. When aides are absent they don't have anyone come in and replace them, they just try and move them around the best they can to where they are needed most. When aides are not in the scheduled room to help, it puts a burden on the teachers. I think we need more aides but having more would not be supported by any outside funding. I think this is something we need to talk about during our strategic planning.
There is concern about the dress code and cell phone use. These rules are hard to enforce. It would help if parents would help by making sure their kids are dressed appropriately. Cell phone use in class is a problem that would also help if parents would talk to their kids about using them only at the appropriate time. Some students don't show proper respect for others and their teachers. It's very hard for the school to deal with students that don't show proper respect. These issues need improvement, but parents need to do their part to help.
The school website needs work. The policies are not on the website yet. I think this will be worked on in the near future. Thanks for all who attended. My wife made some good treats you missed by not coming. As a board member I can't solve everyone's problems to their satisfaction, but I will listen and do what I can. I always respond to school emails. Feel free to let me know your concerns. Thanks, Brian
March 14th School Board Meeting
I know it's been a long time since I wrote a blog. I don't know if anyone will still want to read my blog. I have been very busy trying to survive in a very challenging business. I hope to get back on track writing this. The last few months meetings have also been mostly about policy updates, not the most exciting information.
This meeting we had more going on. Three of the board seats are up for election. Casey, April, and John. John has decided not to run again. I think Paul Jensen is running for John's seat, and April and Casey are running for re-election. I don't know if anyone else is running. I think John has served for eight years and has done a good job.
This meeting was very well attended mostly because of the visiting government class. The sports teams were acknowledged for their accomplishments. The football team went 11-1 and repeated as state runner-up. Coach Drake was voted the coach of the year. The wrestlers had a great year and finished with one state champion, and four others who placed at state. The wrestlers also have been academic state champions nine times. The girls team went 15-8. In the last nine years the girls basketball team has gone to state five times, coming home with four trophies and has been academic champions four times. The boys basketball team went 17-9. Coach Adams was the coach of the year. They have been district champions eight out of the last nine years. They have won four state championships over that time with a record of 108-8. They also have won two academic and two sportsmanship awards. I hope I got the stats right. All of these groups have done very well. They are a great group of kids, with great very dedicated coaches. I also don't think the kids get the credit they deserve for doing so well academically. During our board walk through a few days ago Jeff Gee said about half the student body is currently participating in sports, besides all the students participating in clubs. I think it's great to live in a small district where so many students have the opportunity to participate and they all do so well.
Mr. Kunz went over the safe busing plan and proposed putting a 1994 bus up for auction. It has something like 140,000 miles, not as many as I would think it would have. He really likes the new bus we bought last summer. It is a different make than the rest of the busses, and is a lot nicer to drive.
April had asked Sid to give us an update about the four day week. He gave us information comparing the ISAT test score from this year compared to the year before we switched. Overall there isn't very much difference. The overall cost savings is estimated to be about 50,000. The student attendance is up a little. Overall I think the four day week has worked out well. I asked the students in attendance how they liked it. A couple comments were they liked the three day weekend and thought it was easier to have the long weekend to do home work. We did talk a little about needing to work on a calendar for next year pretty soon. We might add a few days back to the year. I am very much against going past Memorial Day. It is hard on some students to have such long days. I also don't think it's good to add very many days either, because if we do it reduces our savings.
We also had an update about the soccer program. They had a successful first year. There were fifteen girls who participated. I don't think most of these girls would have participated in any other sport. They had very good support from their boosters, raising funds, and helping to work on the field and goal posts. The program was approved for two years and will be evaluated again after next season.
Sid also talked about the work being done to set up new tee-ball, little league backstops. They are going to put four fields in back to back east of the soccer field. This is a much needed improvement.
There was some discussion about legislative issues, but not a lot known yet. I think we need to consider having a levy a year from now. We have a deficit of $100,000 in our budget this year. Our bond on the middle school ends next year, and I think it would be a good time to have one. We need to start talking about the schools needs, so we can establish a levy amount that will put us back into a positive spending balance.
Thanks to all those who read this. I plan in writing another blog about the cottage meeting. If you have questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
This meeting we had more going on. Three of the board seats are up for election. Casey, April, and John. John has decided not to run again. I think Paul Jensen is running for John's seat, and April and Casey are running for re-election. I don't know if anyone else is running. I think John has served for eight years and has done a good job.
This meeting was very well attended mostly because of the visiting government class. The sports teams were acknowledged for their accomplishments. The football team went 11-1 and repeated as state runner-up. Coach Drake was voted the coach of the year. The wrestlers had a great year and finished with one state champion, and four others who placed at state. The wrestlers also have been academic state champions nine times. The girls team went 15-8. In the last nine years the girls basketball team has gone to state five times, coming home with four trophies and has been academic champions four times. The boys basketball team went 17-9. Coach Adams was the coach of the year. They have been district champions eight out of the last nine years. They have won four state championships over that time with a record of 108-8. They also have won two academic and two sportsmanship awards. I hope I got the stats right. All of these groups have done very well. They are a great group of kids, with great very dedicated coaches. I also don't think the kids get the credit they deserve for doing so well academically. During our board walk through a few days ago Jeff Gee said about half the student body is currently participating in sports, besides all the students participating in clubs. I think it's great to live in a small district where so many students have the opportunity to participate and they all do so well.
Mr. Kunz went over the safe busing plan and proposed putting a 1994 bus up for auction. It has something like 140,000 miles, not as many as I would think it would have. He really likes the new bus we bought last summer. It is a different make than the rest of the busses, and is a lot nicer to drive.
April had asked Sid to give us an update about the four day week. He gave us information comparing the ISAT test score from this year compared to the year before we switched. Overall there isn't very much difference. The overall cost savings is estimated to be about 50,000. The student attendance is up a little. Overall I think the four day week has worked out well. I asked the students in attendance how they liked it. A couple comments were they liked the three day weekend and thought it was easier to have the long weekend to do home work. We did talk a little about needing to work on a calendar for next year pretty soon. We might add a few days back to the year. I am very much against going past Memorial Day. It is hard on some students to have such long days. I also don't think it's good to add very many days either, because if we do it reduces our savings.
We also had an update about the soccer program. They had a successful first year. There were fifteen girls who participated. I don't think most of these girls would have participated in any other sport. They had very good support from their boosters, raising funds, and helping to work on the field and goal posts. The program was approved for two years and will be evaluated again after next season.
Sid also talked about the work being done to set up new tee-ball, little league backstops. They are going to put four fields in back to back east of the soccer field. This is a much needed improvement.
There was some discussion about legislative issues, but not a lot known yet. I think we need to consider having a levy a year from now. We have a deficit of $100,000 in our budget this year. Our bond on the middle school ends next year, and I think it would be a good time to have one. We need to start talking about the schools needs, so we can establish a levy amount that will put us back into a positive spending balance.
Thanks to all those who read this. I plan in writing another blog about the cottage meeting. If you have questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
Monday, October 15, 2012
October 15th My view on the Luna Laws
Our board meeting was mostly just about reviewing policies. One note Mr. Tubbs estimated we saved maybe as much as $70,000 going to the four day week.
At the end of the board meeting we were asked about what we thought of the three propositions. I said some of what I thought about it. After listening to a podcast from a KID radio show where Mr. Luna talked about the new laws, I felt compelled to write a letter to the Pioneer and Morning News. I had to reduce this in half to make it fit in the Morning News. I have not heard from the Pioneer. I get so tired of Luna blaming the school districts and teachers for many of the problems. He has a way of not telling the whole truth, so I thought I would tell some of the other side the way I see things.
After I wrote this I found out if these laws are repealed it will cause a lot of problems that will have to be resolved. The requirement for online classes and technology is now law. If the proposition is repealed it will remove the funding, not the law. I think they will have to pass new legislation to remove the law. Schools can not afford an unfunded mandate like this.
Another concern brought to me is about the pay for performance. With many plans in place setting up the guidelines, if the law fails, it will be very hard for schools to figure out what to do if their plan is under contract with the teachers, and then they don't end up with the funding. I can understand there will be challenges, but I still maintain these are bad laws. I compared it to what I think of Obama care. Some of Obama care is in place, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be changed.
I think if the legislature and the Department of Education would have worked more with teachers and school boards they would have come up with a better plan, and we wouldn't have all the conflict we are dealing with now.
If you have any questions after reading this let me know. Good or bad I guess I say what I think.
Propositions
I am on the Firth school board and wanted to address my thoughts about the propositions. I am basically neutral on Proposition one. I don't think this proposition effects our school very much either way. I want to mainly address the other propositions. I would strongly encourage a no vote on each of these. Prop. 2 pay for performance. They make it very confusing so it's very hard to understand. Basically all schools are evaluated and put on a bell curve, just like some grades are given out in school. The top of the curve schools get a full share of funding from the state. It works it's way down. The lower the evaluation goes the less money is paid, until the lowest get nothing. One thing to keep in mind. No mater what a district chooses to do, a teacher can only get one full share, no more. So if the school is at the top level they will all get the same amount of money. If a district wants to reward teachers for performance, the rewards have to go to a group of teachers teaching or doing the same thing, and only if the school as a whole does not qualify for a whole share. So for example you want to reward the school math teachers because they raised student achievement. But in this example the school only qualifies for half a share. The only way to reward the math teachers is to take away from the teachers who received a half a share, so they will get even less, and give part of their share to the math teachers. Is this fair? What if one math teacher is poor and the all the others are excellent, but because of the weak teacher achievement isn't high enough, then no one will get extra performance money. This can put teachers against each other. Administering this from the state must require a lot of extra time and expense that could be used to raise all teacher's pay.
Proposition 3. To me this is the worst one. Requiring all students to take two online classes will be a real challenge for a small district like ours. I have a hard time believing the state will really provide all the funding for this program. For one thing there is no new funding to replace the teachers we had to cut, because we received less funding from the state and federal governments. Our total funding has dropped $746,000 since the 2009-2010 school year. Now we are supposed to come up with the teachers to help with the online classes. I believe many students will struggle with this requirement. I think it would have been good to offer online classes to those who want to take them, but not to make it a requirement. Since the classes are going to be provided by teachers outside of the district, the funding for these classes will have to follow. There is some ways to mitigate some of this expense, but not all. I don't think funding will go back into the district to replace these lost dollars.
There are so many half truths out there clouding this issue. I recently heard Tom Luna on the radio. I want to set straight a few things he said. He talked about increasing school funding. Schools are paid by a unit of students, for the M&O budget. The older the kids the less kids it takes to make a unit. We used to get about $24,000 per unit. Last year we received $19,626. Each district's state funding for teachers had been based on the number of these units. If we chose to have less we wouldn't save any money, the state would just keep the money. If a district wants more teachers, they would pay for them through a supplemental levy. As the state reduced school funding they made some changes to how this works. The state didn't change the number of units, or teachers we qualify for. They gave districts discretion to lay off a certain percent of the teachers, and can now use the money saved to supplement the drop in the M&O budget and other budget cuts. So by laying off teachers, we look like the bad guys not the state. He talks about funding going up for this year. They raised this budget $80 per unit. Not much of an increase.
He claimed when the districts received federal stimulus funding, that we probably used much of these funds to hire more teachers. So it wasn't the states fault that since this funding is gone that now districts have to lay off teachers. We didn't hire anymore teachers. We used most of the money to help replace part of what I think was a 7% teacher pay cut the state imposed. The rest helped pay for an increase in insurance costs. He also doesn't mention some state funding was lowered when federal money came in.
He says class sizes are determined at the local level. He also says the Students Come First laws don't effect class sizes. Because of less state funding we have laid off I think four teachers. So some of our class sizes have gone up. The only way to maintain class sizes is through supplemental levies, which we don't have. Some of the reduction for funding of teachers may have come first, but most of the new money for education is going back to Students Come First, not used to restore teaching positions or our M&O budget. Others talk about funding for Proposition 3 as an unfunded mandate that will lead to higher property taxes. Well in this sense it is. Because the state chooses not to restore these funds, many districts are depending on supplemental levies, which in fact have raised property taxes.
I have nothing to do with any union. I am as republican as anyone can be. But these so called Luna laws are a big mistake. Thanks, Brian Esplin
At the end of the board meeting we were asked about what we thought of the three propositions. I said some of what I thought about it. After listening to a podcast from a KID radio show where Mr. Luna talked about the new laws, I felt compelled to write a letter to the Pioneer and Morning News. I had to reduce this in half to make it fit in the Morning News. I have not heard from the Pioneer. I get so tired of Luna blaming the school districts and teachers for many of the problems. He has a way of not telling the whole truth, so I thought I would tell some of the other side the way I see things.
After I wrote this I found out if these laws are repealed it will cause a lot of problems that will have to be resolved. The requirement for online classes and technology is now law. If the proposition is repealed it will remove the funding, not the law. I think they will have to pass new legislation to remove the law. Schools can not afford an unfunded mandate like this.
Another concern brought to me is about the pay for performance. With many plans in place setting up the guidelines, if the law fails, it will be very hard for schools to figure out what to do if their plan is under contract with the teachers, and then they don't end up with the funding. I can understand there will be challenges, but I still maintain these are bad laws. I compared it to what I think of Obama care. Some of Obama care is in place, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be changed.
I think if the legislature and the Department of Education would have worked more with teachers and school boards they would have come up with a better plan, and we wouldn't have all the conflict we are dealing with now.
If you have any questions after reading this let me know. Good or bad I guess I say what I think.
Propositions
I am on the Firth school board and wanted to address my thoughts about the propositions. I am basically neutral on Proposition one. I don't think this proposition effects our school very much either way. I want to mainly address the other propositions. I would strongly encourage a no vote on each of these. Prop. 2 pay for performance. They make it very confusing so it's very hard to understand. Basically all schools are evaluated and put on a bell curve, just like some grades are given out in school. The top of the curve schools get a full share of funding from the state. It works it's way down. The lower the evaluation goes the less money is paid, until the lowest get nothing. One thing to keep in mind. No mater what a district chooses to do, a teacher can only get one full share, no more. So if the school is at the top level they will all get the same amount of money. If a district wants to reward teachers for performance, the rewards have to go to a group of teachers teaching or doing the same thing, and only if the school as a whole does not qualify for a whole share. So for example you want to reward the school math teachers because they raised student achievement. But in this example the school only qualifies for half a share. The only way to reward the math teachers is to take away from the teachers who received a half a share, so they will get even less, and give part of their share to the math teachers. Is this fair? What if one math teacher is poor and the all the others are excellent, but because of the weak teacher achievement isn't high enough, then no one will get extra performance money. This can put teachers against each other. Administering this from the state must require a lot of extra time and expense that could be used to raise all teacher's pay.
Proposition 3. To me this is the worst one. Requiring all students to take two online classes will be a real challenge for a small district like ours. I have a hard time believing the state will really provide all the funding for this program. For one thing there is no new funding to replace the teachers we had to cut, because we received less funding from the state and federal governments. Our total funding has dropped $746,000 since the 2009-2010 school year. Now we are supposed to come up with the teachers to help with the online classes. I believe many students will struggle with this requirement. I think it would have been good to offer online classes to those who want to take them, but not to make it a requirement. Since the classes are going to be provided by teachers outside of the district, the funding for these classes will have to follow. There is some ways to mitigate some of this expense, but not all. I don't think funding will go back into the district to replace these lost dollars.
There are so many half truths out there clouding this issue. I recently heard Tom Luna on the radio. I want to set straight a few things he said. He talked about increasing school funding. Schools are paid by a unit of students, for the M&O budget. The older the kids the less kids it takes to make a unit. We used to get about $24,000 per unit. Last year we received $19,626. Each district's state funding for teachers had been based on the number of these units. If we chose to have less we wouldn't save any money, the state would just keep the money. If a district wants more teachers, they would pay for them through a supplemental levy. As the state reduced school funding they made some changes to how this works. The state didn't change the number of units, or teachers we qualify for. They gave districts discretion to lay off a certain percent of the teachers, and can now use the money saved to supplement the drop in the M&O budget and other budget cuts. So by laying off teachers, we look like the bad guys not the state. He talks about funding going up for this year. They raised this budget $80 per unit. Not much of an increase.
He claimed when the districts received federal stimulus funding, that we probably used much of these funds to hire more teachers. So it wasn't the states fault that since this funding is gone that now districts have to lay off teachers. We didn't hire anymore teachers. We used most of the money to help replace part of what I think was a 7% teacher pay cut the state imposed. The rest helped pay for an increase in insurance costs. He also doesn't mention some state funding was lowered when federal money came in.
He says class sizes are determined at the local level. He also says the Students Come First laws don't effect class sizes. Because of less state funding we have laid off I think four teachers. So some of our class sizes have gone up. The only way to maintain class sizes is through supplemental levies, which we don't have. Some of the reduction for funding of teachers may have come first, but most of the new money for education is going back to Students Come First, not used to restore teaching positions or our M&O budget. Others talk about funding for Proposition 3 as an unfunded mandate that will lead to higher property taxes. Well in this sense it is. Because the state chooses not to restore these funds, many districts are depending on supplemental levies, which in fact have raised property taxes.
I have nothing to do with any union. I am as republican as anyone can be. But these so called Luna laws are a big mistake. Thanks, Brian Esplin
Sunday, September 16, 2012
September 13th Board Meeting
This probably wasn't one of our most interesting meetings, but we did go through quite a few things. Casey was out of town so John conducted the meeting.
One of the main things we went over was the audit report. Mr. Morgan Hatt reported on the audit report. I haven't had time to go over it in detail. But I will go over some highlights. We had budgeted for a $232,357 deficit in our general fund budget. Our deficit ended up being $28,879 or a difference of $203,478, much better than what was budgeted. The non general fund budget revenue from property tax, state, federal and other local taxes exceeded expenditures by $120,747. This money will go into our contingency fund, leaving the balance at the beginning of this school year at $800,000. I think maintaining this amount in our contingency fund is very good considering that our general fund revenue is $646,866 less than it was at this time in 2009. The administrators and everyone else who helps manage our school expenditures have done a very good job. One item I noticed was that our transportation costs dropped $20,000. I asked now that our audit is done, if they can give us better information about how much we saved on the four day schedule. I think they will have that for us next month. A couple more things of interest. Our best average daily attendance over 28 weeks was 696 and we spent $7,083 per student. I think this is about an average amount for our size of school. Idaho is 49th with only Utah lower, in how much the state provides per student. I asked if the schools he audits spends this much per student without an override levy. He said either they have one or as one school did, they took $500,000 out of their plant facility fund to get by for a year. He questioned the legality of what this school did. The state lawyers didn't agree with the school lawyers. He has not done very many audits yet.
Scott Jolley presented the ISAT testing results. The elementary and high school met AYP. There are several segments of how they divide up the kids for testing. The middle school missed AYP for the economically disadvantaged in math by less than one percentage point. If Idaho gets exempted from No Child Left Behind laws like they think they will, this process will change. They will go to what is called the STAR Status program. Basically a scale from 1 to 5. Scott thinks if they go to this it will be easier to make improvements. They have plans now to improve where things are deficient. Some highlights of the test results. In the 3rd grade 96% were advanced or proficient. The middle school met AYP in the two categories they missed last year. The high school continues to reach 100% graduation rate.
We then went over several policy updates. We had gone over most of them at our work session. We needed to change the length of the school day. We talked about the use of electronic devises and other media. The absences allowed was changed from a number to a 90% attendance requirement. We spent quite awhile talking about our board goals. We will go over them more at our next meeting with Casey back. We are setting goals to have more work sessions. Setting a date each year to review the districts overall financial situation. I had suggested that we review our goals more often. I also suggested that we publish a district newsletter maybe quarterly. This could be put on the web site, and maybe have some to give out at the back to school night or parent teacher conferences. If you haven't checked it out the web site looks a lot better. There are more goals and details. If we get them set I will provide more information next month. One thing I don't think we have done very good at is, we should ask patrons, what goals would you like us to have? We need to evaluate ourselves as board members better and ask for suggestions of what things you can see that we as board members or the district need improvement on or goals you would like us to work on. If you have suggestions let me know.
There was a paper given to us by the teachers requesting us to add some things back into policy to define some things for their benefit or protection, since there is no real collective bargaining agreements anymore. We will probably have a work meeting to go over this in detail and will probably need to discuss some of their requests with a lawyer.
We then had public comments. There was a concern about soccer presented, but it was somewhat mitigated because April and I had responded to him and tried to answer his concerns since our last meeting and he thanked us for doing so.
I asked afterwords if anything had come up requesting a discussion about consolidation. I was told no. Maybe my letter to the paper quieted things down about this issue. I do believe trying to be proactive in communication does bring about positive results.
That is all I can think of for this blog. I am off to Chicago Monday for one of my other board meetings. I have a major issue at that meeting I will try to defend and will have to in front of about 100 staff and board members. If you have any questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
One of the main things we went over was the audit report. Mr. Morgan Hatt reported on the audit report. I haven't had time to go over it in detail. But I will go over some highlights. We had budgeted for a $232,357 deficit in our general fund budget. Our deficit ended up being $28,879 or a difference of $203,478, much better than what was budgeted. The non general fund budget revenue from property tax, state, federal and other local taxes exceeded expenditures by $120,747. This money will go into our contingency fund, leaving the balance at the beginning of this school year at $800,000. I think maintaining this amount in our contingency fund is very good considering that our general fund revenue is $646,866 less than it was at this time in 2009. The administrators and everyone else who helps manage our school expenditures have done a very good job. One item I noticed was that our transportation costs dropped $20,000. I asked now that our audit is done, if they can give us better information about how much we saved on the four day schedule. I think they will have that for us next month. A couple more things of interest. Our best average daily attendance over 28 weeks was 696 and we spent $7,083 per student. I think this is about an average amount for our size of school. Idaho is 49th with only Utah lower, in how much the state provides per student. I asked if the schools he audits spends this much per student without an override levy. He said either they have one or as one school did, they took $500,000 out of their plant facility fund to get by for a year. He questioned the legality of what this school did. The state lawyers didn't agree with the school lawyers. He has not done very many audits yet.
Scott Jolley presented the ISAT testing results. The elementary and high school met AYP. There are several segments of how they divide up the kids for testing. The middle school missed AYP for the economically disadvantaged in math by less than one percentage point. If Idaho gets exempted from No Child Left Behind laws like they think they will, this process will change. They will go to what is called the STAR Status program. Basically a scale from 1 to 5. Scott thinks if they go to this it will be easier to make improvements. They have plans now to improve where things are deficient. Some highlights of the test results. In the 3rd grade 96% were advanced or proficient. The middle school met AYP in the two categories they missed last year. The high school continues to reach 100% graduation rate.
We then went over several policy updates. We had gone over most of them at our work session. We needed to change the length of the school day. We talked about the use of electronic devises and other media. The absences allowed was changed from a number to a 90% attendance requirement. We spent quite awhile talking about our board goals. We will go over them more at our next meeting with Casey back. We are setting goals to have more work sessions. Setting a date each year to review the districts overall financial situation. I had suggested that we review our goals more often. I also suggested that we publish a district newsletter maybe quarterly. This could be put on the web site, and maybe have some to give out at the back to school night or parent teacher conferences. If you haven't checked it out the web site looks a lot better. There are more goals and details. If we get them set I will provide more information next month. One thing I don't think we have done very good at is, we should ask patrons, what goals would you like us to have? We need to evaluate ourselves as board members better and ask for suggestions of what things you can see that we as board members or the district need improvement on or goals you would like us to work on. If you have suggestions let me know.
There was a paper given to us by the teachers requesting us to add some things back into policy to define some things for their benefit or protection, since there is no real collective bargaining agreements anymore. We will probably have a work meeting to go over this in detail and will probably need to discuss some of their requests with a lawyer.
We then had public comments. There was a concern about soccer presented, but it was somewhat mitigated because April and I had responded to him and tried to answer his concerns since our last meeting and he thanked us for doing so.
I asked afterwords if anything had come up requesting a discussion about consolidation. I was told no. Maybe my letter to the paper quieted things down about this issue. I do believe trying to be proactive in communication does bring about positive results.
That is all I can think of for this blog. I am off to Chicago Monday for one of my other board meetings. I have a major issue at that meeting I will try to defend and will have to in front of about 100 staff and board members. If you have any questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
Friday, August 24, 2012
Consolidation Response Letter
The letter below is what I submitted to the Pioneer in response to the conversation I had with Mr. Price from Shelley who is encouraging consolidation, and from what was said in Wednesdays paper.
Another point I didn't state in my response was when I talked about how I did not think Firth patrons would support this idea in part because of the cost. I mentioned how when we tried to pass two different override levies, that were not for very much money compared to this, that they had both failed. His response back to me was something to the effect that. If the Firth board would approve the consolidation, then since Shelley patrons out number Firth patron by such a wide margin, it wouldn't matter what Firth wanted to do. Shelley would then have enough votes to pass whatever funding that was needed without Firth support. Needless to say that sure didn't go over well with me. And I think points out a big problem with the idea of consolidation. Losing control of how we are taxed, and how the Firth patrons would be treated. I think at some point unless the state comes through with more funding we will need to pass an levy. But I would never want to force the issue like he suggested. We will need to approve one with the purpose well defined, not through force or some kind of trick.
Consolidation
Being a person that doesn't shy away from expressing my opinion, I felt compelled to respond to the article about consolidation. I am on the Firth school board and I am one who would have to be convinced that we should consider consolidation. My wife and I met with Mr. Price a couple weeks ago where he presented his groups ideas and we discussed it for about an hour and a half.
To me there are many more negatives than there are positives, especially for the people from Firth. Talking with Mr. Price and reading the article I get the impression that they think it is a bad thing for Firth to be so small, and the outlook for slow growth, if any growth at all, is also a negative thing. To me that is a very positive thing. I guess I'm one who thinks if you want to send your kids to a big school then you should live in the cities, don't try and make Firth into a big city school.
During our discussion I mentioned that we had an AG program with some classes in welding. He seemed intrigued by the idea to make Firth into some kind of trade school. I tried explaining to him our program is small. The classes are held in a very old facility with very limited space. They have keep it pretty well maintained, but I don't think there is room for many more students. If the idea is to greatly expand Firth into a trade school, all new facilities would have to be built.
I know we don't provide every elective program they offer in larger schools, but that doesn't mean we don't provide a good education. Besides our success in athletic achievement over the last several years, we have won many academic awards also. Almost anyone who wants to participate in a school sport can. I would guess as a percentage Firth has a lot higher number of kids involved in sports, than have the opportunity to participate in Shelley. If you have ever attended a Firth state football or basketball game, you would think there are more Firth fans there than live in the district.
I think getting support from Firth to help fund the growth in Shelley is also very unlikely. In recent elections where Shelley and Firth have jointly voted on bonds, that were probably perceived to help Shelley more than Firth, they failed because of lack of enough support from Firth. Currently our school bond debt will be paid in full on June of 2014. I don't believe Firth patrons would like to bond for the level of debt to build a new library, auditorium, and community center. Let alone building a big technical school or future north Bingham county high school.
As we are now we have a lot of empty classrooms mostly in the elementary. So as far as facilities are concerned there is no pressure to build anything new, like they have had to keep doing in Shelley. Also most of our class sizes are small. There are very few classes in the elementary with more than twenty students, most have even less. I believe Shelley's elementary classes are quite a bit bigger.
I think it was a couple years ago the state was offering to fund a consolidation study for Bingham county. Firth's share to do the study was several thousand dollars. The state would pay for the study we just needed to agree to participate. There was no support from the board, even under these terms to participate in the study. They did the study anyway. I don't think the results from that study indicated many advantages for consolidation, and some obvious disadvantages.
One more area of concern, I could continue with more, is the matter of board representation. I don't know for sure how the numbers would break down, but I would think with a five member board, Firth area would have only one board member in a consolidated district. Maybe part of another. So if we agreed to consolidation, in most ways Shelley would have complete control over the former Firth district.
I was not invited to the meeting referenced in the paper, as the article claimed I was. Which went on to say because no one showed up no one was available to give their opinion about consolidation. Well now you now have mine.
As I say after the blog I write after our school board meetings. If you have any comments or questions let me know. If there are those in our district who support consolidation and you would like to tell me why you think it would be a good idea let me know.
Thank you, Brian Esplin. My school email is. besplin@d59.k12.id.us
Another point I didn't state in my response was when I talked about how I did not think Firth patrons would support this idea in part because of the cost. I mentioned how when we tried to pass two different override levies, that were not for very much money compared to this, that they had both failed. His response back to me was something to the effect that. If the Firth board would approve the consolidation, then since Shelley patrons out number Firth patron by such a wide margin, it wouldn't matter what Firth wanted to do. Shelley would then have enough votes to pass whatever funding that was needed without Firth support. Needless to say that sure didn't go over well with me. And I think points out a big problem with the idea of consolidation. Losing control of how we are taxed, and how the Firth patrons would be treated. I think at some point unless the state comes through with more funding we will need to pass an levy. But I would never want to force the issue like he suggested. We will need to approve one with the purpose well defined, not through force or some kind of trick.
Consolidation
Being a person that doesn't shy away from expressing my opinion, I felt compelled to respond to the article about consolidation. I am on the Firth school board and I am one who would have to be convinced that we should consider consolidation. My wife and I met with Mr. Price a couple weeks ago where he presented his groups ideas and we discussed it for about an hour and a half.
To me there are many more negatives than there are positives, especially for the people from Firth. Talking with Mr. Price and reading the article I get the impression that they think it is a bad thing for Firth to be so small, and the outlook for slow growth, if any growth at all, is also a negative thing. To me that is a very positive thing. I guess I'm one who thinks if you want to send your kids to a big school then you should live in the cities, don't try and make Firth into a big city school.
During our discussion I mentioned that we had an AG program with some classes in welding. He seemed intrigued by the idea to make Firth into some kind of trade school. I tried explaining to him our program is small. The classes are held in a very old facility with very limited space. They have keep it pretty well maintained, but I don't think there is room for many more students. If the idea is to greatly expand Firth into a trade school, all new facilities would have to be built.
I know we don't provide every elective program they offer in larger schools, but that doesn't mean we don't provide a good education. Besides our success in athletic achievement over the last several years, we have won many academic awards also. Almost anyone who wants to participate in a school sport can. I would guess as a percentage Firth has a lot higher number of kids involved in sports, than have the opportunity to participate in Shelley. If you have ever attended a Firth state football or basketball game, you would think there are more Firth fans there than live in the district.
I think getting support from Firth to help fund the growth in Shelley is also very unlikely. In recent elections where Shelley and Firth have jointly voted on bonds, that were probably perceived to help Shelley more than Firth, they failed because of lack of enough support from Firth. Currently our school bond debt will be paid in full on June of 2014. I don't believe Firth patrons would like to bond for the level of debt to build a new library, auditorium, and community center. Let alone building a big technical school or future north Bingham county high school.
As we are now we have a lot of empty classrooms mostly in the elementary. So as far as facilities are concerned there is no pressure to build anything new, like they have had to keep doing in Shelley. Also most of our class sizes are small. There are very few classes in the elementary with more than twenty students, most have even less. I believe Shelley's elementary classes are quite a bit bigger.
I think it was a couple years ago the state was offering to fund a consolidation study for Bingham county. Firth's share to do the study was several thousand dollars. The state would pay for the study we just needed to agree to participate. There was no support from the board, even under these terms to participate in the study. They did the study anyway. I don't think the results from that study indicated many advantages for consolidation, and some obvious disadvantages.
One more area of concern, I could continue with more, is the matter of board representation. I don't know for sure how the numbers would break down, but I would think with a five member board, Firth area would have only one board member in a consolidated district. Maybe part of another. So if we agreed to consolidation, in most ways Shelley would have complete control over the former Firth district.
I was not invited to the meeting referenced in the paper, as the article claimed I was. Which went on to say because no one showed up no one was available to give their opinion about consolidation. Well now you now have mine.
As I say after the blog I write after our school board meetings. If you have any comments or questions let me know. If there are those in our district who support consolidation and you would like to tell me why you think it would be a good idea let me know.
Thank you, Brian Esplin. My school email is. besplin@d59.k12.id.us
Saturday, August 11, 2012
August 9th 2012 Board Meeting
Missing last month's board meeting, makes it seem like it has been a long time since I have written a blog. I understand last month's meeting was over very fast, something like twenty minutes. I enjoyed my time with my wife and daughter in Orlando at the FCCLA competition. The girls did very well.
A lot of this month's board meeting was spent talking about the board training April and I went to August 2nd in Rigby. So I will mix in what happened at the board meeting with some information I received at the training.
Our first matter of business was to elect a Vice Chair, John Monson was elected. So in case you missed it last month Casey Park will serve as board Chairman and John will serve as Vice Chair for the next year.
Christine Nelson was presented as the new first grade teacher. Sharolyn Peterson, a former FHS graduate, will be the new high school English teacher.
The next topic was the board training. I first went over some information and mixed in some questions that April and I had that came up at the meeting.
Some of the information:
ISAT tests have a pool of 150 questions to choose 30 from. Core Standards testing will have 4000 questions. Grades 3-10 will be tested. Another reason to be prepared for Common Core is after next year the Pay for Performance will be based on Common Core testing. Some schools are adding as much as a week more to the school year to better prepare for this new testing. They told us about an Ap you can get for your smart phone or computer put out by MasteryConnect. It is very detailed, but anyone can look at it to see what will be expected.
At the training they talked about how we need to reinforce positive things going on at school. They recommended every year that each board member sign a Code of Ethics statement. I provided a copy of the ethics statement to each board member. We have not done this since I have been on the board.
They recommended we set our Board Goals in a June work session. Publicize our goals in July, ask for public input on what they think of our goals, and revise and adopt our goals in August. Then follow up in January and May to see how we are doing. It was also recommended that we connect our board goals with our agenda. This board meeting is the first time we have talked about our goals this year. I think the training recommendations are good, hopefully we can follow this process in the future.
Another recommendation was to be sure we re-ask questions to the administration that come up, even if we have been given the answer. That way we are proving we are doing our do diligence as board members, by informing the public. I have tried to do this most of the time, and think it is important and I'm glad they affirmed this procedure.
Now for some of the questions. We asked about Pay for Performance and if we are going to come up with our own plan, not the State's like we followed last year. If we want something different we need to decide this by September 1st. This will be talked about in a work meeting next Thursday, August 16th at 8:00 pm in the High School Library.
I asked when do we need to go over the Superintendent Evaluation Component for Pay For Performance. I think we usually go over his goals in January, but with changes coming I think we need to get started figuring this out. I gave Mr. Tubbs some information about this process. I'm not sure when it will be on our agenda.
I asked about the Idaho Leads Group, and if any consideration had been give to join this group of 49 districts involved. I didn't find out much about this at the training. It has something to do with helping to figure out the development of the new state standards coming. I didn't find out anymore about this, because Mr. Tubbs hadn't heard anything about it. He will find out more.
At the training I asked what is the best time to ask questions as a board member, if the topic isn't on the agenda? They recommended adding a Reports and Recognition Section to our board meeting. Casey was concerned that doing this might violate in some way open meeting laws. I stated and asked if I was right, that it's okay to ask questions and have some discussion, as long as no board action was taken by what was brought up. Mr. Tubbs said I was right. Most questions I have are about how we are doing on certain things and want an update, or items that I think should be discussed at a future time. Casey plans on contacting board members the week before board meetings to see if we have items we would like on the agenda. This would help and has never been done in the past. Many times we don't get our board meeting information until two days before our board meeting, which makes it hard to review and suggest anything for the agenda.
Another agenda recommendation was to add a Student Involvement Section, items like a presentation, success story, and awards. They also recommended a few minutes of board training. I guess they used to do this before I came on the board. I don't know if these agenda ideas will be incorporated.
I asked if we had a published List of Procedures, and if we did, could I get a copy. Mr. Tubbs said some are in our policy manual, but some are not. He is going to get that information. This also kind of goes along with the district Strategic Plan. They talked about this at training and April and I knew nothing about it. He was asked about this ahead of time and provided a copy for us. The committee has been given the responsibility of reviewing the Plan.
I handed out some more information at the meeting. There is two handouts about what every board member needs to know about Governance and Team Operations, and about the district. Some of the governance is about protocols. I don't know how all these things have been done, and would like to have more discussion about these handouts.
One last handout and information from the meeting was about doing a Board of Trustees Self Assessment. We are doing a lot more evaluations of everybody at the school, I think we should do this assessment. It was suggested to me that we fill this out how we think we as individuals are doing and how we think the board is doing. I suggested we use this to help come up with our board goals. It was determined that we fill this out how we think the board is doing, turn the assessment into the district office and have the board clerk compile the information anonymously. We will do this before our work meeting next week and talk over areas that we need to improve on. After looking this over, I think it won't be hard to find needed areas for improvement.
Well on to the rest of the meeting. Mr. Gee reported on what had been done to prepare for the Common Core Standards. He talked about some training and conferences the staff had participated in. They are working on this and will throughout the year to be ready to start teaching to these standards next year. I hope they will be ready. One concern I brought up is needing to know what curriculum we will need to purchase to be prepaired for this. Curriculum is very expensive, and we need to know this as soon as possible. They are not sure yet what we will need.
A few weeks ago I was looking through our Online Policy Manual. Most meetings we get policy updates from ISBA to consider. These policies are more generic state policies that need changed, by new laws or changing a little language. There are other things that are more district specific that we need to update. The policies we did update last year have mostly not been updated in our Online Manual. Mr. Tubbs said they would work on doing this. After reading through a lot of our policies online I came up with a list of policies that I think need reviewed.
-1. The length of day and teacher requirements of the school day need re-defined to match up with our current schedule.
-2. We need to either change our policy towards President's Day being a school holiday, or revise our calendar to take President's Day off.
-3. I think since it is likely we will need to move teachers around each year to accommodate changing class sizes with limited staff, we need to review policy how this should be done, with, if possible, a specified date each year to inform teachers when they will have to change to give them time to prepare for the changes. In our manual it just says before the start of the next school year. Sometimes it might not be determined until the beginning of the school year, but most of the time changes coming should be known long before then.
-4. As I understand it our policy states we are supposed to have new hire recommendations presented to us before they are actually hired. If this isn't how we want to do this then we need to change our policy accordingly.
The plan is to go over some policy changes at our Work Meeting, including our new Phone Use Policy. I think we need to figure out how to review our policies. They gave us ideas of how to do this at the training.
We then had Public Comment. There was some concerns expressed about having short term goals to reach our long term goals. Concerns about not having all the teachers at parent teacher conferences. It was suggested we send out emails to inform parents about the conferences.
Concern was expressed about what will be required for Senior Projects, a new requirement starting this year. I think we will go over this more in the future. Concern about our Common Core preparations. Another patron also expressed concern about the new soccer program. Mostly how this might impact other sports.
We then went into executive session and talked about some personnel issues. I think we left about 11:00, much longer than last time. I know this is very long, but if you like to know the details of what went on, now you know. I will probably write another update after our work session next week. As always if you have questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
A lot of this month's board meeting was spent talking about the board training April and I went to August 2nd in Rigby. So I will mix in what happened at the board meeting with some information I received at the training.
Our first matter of business was to elect a Vice Chair, John Monson was elected. So in case you missed it last month Casey Park will serve as board Chairman and John will serve as Vice Chair for the next year.
Christine Nelson was presented as the new first grade teacher. Sharolyn Peterson, a former FHS graduate, will be the new high school English teacher.
The next topic was the board training. I first went over some information and mixed in some questions that April and I had that came up at the meeting.
Some of the information:
ISAT tests have a pool of 150 questions to choose 30 from. Core Standards testing will have 4000 questions. Grades 3-10 will be tested. Another reason to be prepared for Common Core is after next year the Pay for Performance will be based on Common Core testing. Some schools are adding as much as a week more to the school year to better prepare for this new testing. They told us about an Ap you can get for your smart phone or computer put out by MasteryConnect. It is very detailed, but anyone can look at it to see what will be expected.
At the training they talked about how we need to reinforce positive things going on at school. They recommended every year that each board member sign a Code of Ethics statement. I provided a copy of the ethics statement to each board member. We have not done this since I have been on the board.
They recommended we set our Board Goals in a June work session. Publicize our goals in July, ask for public input on what they think of our goals, and revise and adopt our goals in August. Then follow up in January and May to see how we are doing. It was also recommended that we connect our board goals with our agenda. This board meeting is the first time we have talked about our goals this year. I think the training recommendations are good, hopefully we can follow this process in the future.
Another recommendation was to be sure we re-ask questions to the administration that come up, even if we have been given the answer. That way we are proving we are doing our do diligence as board members, by informing the public. I have tried to do this most of the time, and think it is important and I'm glad they affirmed this procedure.
Now for some of the questions. We asked about Pay for Performance and if we are going to come up with our own plan, not the State's like we followed last year. If we want something different we need to decide this by September 1st. This will be talked about in a work meeting next Thursday, August 16th at 8:00 pm in the High School Library.
I asked when do we need to go over the Superintendent Evaluation Component for Pay For Performance. I think we usually go over his goals in January, but with changes coming I think we need to get started figuring this out. I gave Mr. Tubbs some information about this process. I'm not sure when it will be on our agenda.
I asked about the Idaho Leads Group, and if any consideration had been give to join this group of 49 districts involved. I didn't find out much about this at the training. It has something to do with helping to figure out the development of the new state standards coming. I didn't find out anymore about this, because Mr. Tubbs hadn't heard anything about it. He will find out more.
At the training I asked what is the best time to ask questions as a board member, if the topic isn't on the agenda? They recommended adding a Reports and Recognition Section to our board meeting. Casey was concerned that doing this might violate in some way open meeting laws. I stated and asked if I was right, that it's okay to ask questions and have some discussion, as long as no board action was taken by what was brought up. Mr. Tubbs said I was right. Most questions I have are about how we are doing on certain things and want an update, or items that I think should be discussed at a future time. Casey plans on contacting board members the week before board meetings to see if we have items we would like on the agenda. This would help and has never been done in the past. Many times we don't get our board meeting information until two days before our board meeting, which makes it hard to review and suggest anything for the agenda.
Another agenda recommendation was to add a Student Involvement Section, items like a presentation, success story, and awards. They also recommended a few minutes of board training. I guess they used to do this before I came on the board. I don't know if these agenda ideas will be incorporated.
I asked if we had a published List of Procedures, and if we did, could I get a copy. Mr. Tubbs said some are in our policy manual, but some are not. He is going to get that information. This also kind of goes along with the district Strategic Plan. They talked about this at training and April and I knew nothing about it. He was asked about this ahead of time and provided a copy for us. The committee has been given the responsibility of reviewing the Plan.
I handed out some more information at the meeting. There is two handouts about what every board member needs to know about Governance and Team Operations, and about the district. Some of the governance is about protocols. I don't know how all these things have been done, and would like to have more discussion about these handouts.
One last handout and information from the meeting was about doing a Board of Trustees Self Assessment. We are doing a lot more evaluations of everybody at the school, I think we should do this assessment. It was suggested to me that we fill this out how we think we as individuals are doing and how we think the board is doing. I suggested we use this to help come up with our board goals. It was determined that we fill this out how we think the board is doing, turn the assessment into the district office and have the board clerk compile the information anonymously. We will do this before our work meeting next week and talk over areas that we need to improve on. After looking this over, I think it won't be hard to find needed areas for improvement.
Well on to the rest of the meeting. Mr. Gee reported on what had been done to prepare for the Common Core Standards. He talked about some training and conferences the staff had participated in. They are working on this and will throughout the year to be ready to start teaching to these standards next year. I hope they will be ready. One concern I brought up is needing to know what curriculum we will need to purchase to be prepaired for this. Curriculum is very expensive, and we need to know this as soon as possible. They are not sure yet what we will need.
A few weeks ago I was looking through our Online Policy Manual. Most meetings we get policy updates from ISBA to consider. These policies are more generic state policies that need changed, by new laws or changing a little language. There are other things that are more district specific that we need to update. The policies we did update last year have mostly not been updated in our Online Manual. Mr. Tubbs said they would work on doing this. After reading through a lot of our policies online I came up with a list of policies that I think need reviewed.
-1. The length of day and teacher requirements of the school day need re-defined to match up with our current schedule.
-2. We need to either change our policy towards President's Day being a school holiday, or revise our calendar to take President's Day off.
-3. I think since it is likely we will need to move teachers around each year to accommodate changing class sizes with limited staff, we need to review policy how this should be done, with, if possible, a specified date each year to inform teachers when they will have to change to give them time to prepare for the changes. In our manual it just says before the start of the next school year. Sometimes it might not be determined until the beginning of the school year, but most of the time changes coming should be known long before then.
-4. As I understand it our policy states we are supposed to have new hire recommendations presented to us before they are actually hired. If this isn't how we want to do this then we need to change our policy accordingly.
The plan is to go over some policy changes at our Work Meeting, including our new Phone Use Policy. I think we need to figure out how to review our policies. They gave us ideas of how to do this at the training.
We then had Public Comment. There was some concerns expressed about having short term goals to reach our long term goals. Concerns about not having all the teachers at parent teacher conferences. It was suggested we send out emails to inform parents about the conferences.
Concern was expressed about what will be required for Senior Projects, a new requirement starting this year. I think we will go over this more in the future. Concern about our Common Core preparations. Another patron also expressed concern about the new soccer program. Mostly how this might impact other sports.
We then went into executive session and talked about some personnel issues. I think we left about 11:00, much longer than last time. I know this is very long, but if you like to know the details of what went on, now you know. I will probably write another update after our work session next week. As always if you have questions or comments let me know. Thanks, Brian
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