by Garrick Moritz, Gazette
The Garretson School held their regular monthly meeting on March 13, and the most heated discussion was about whether to extend the school year or eliminate vacation days or make Wednesday afternoons regular school days. As of now, the plan is to hold school classes until May 25th of this year.
As they approved their meeting agenda they modified the tail end of the agenda to not include the renewal/extension of administrator contracts. Shannon Nordstrom told the Gazette after the meeting that normally the March meeting is when that issue is discussed and voted on, but this year the board is choosing to wait until after the results of the opt out vote.
At the end of the meeting, in place of that discussion item was a personnel action after a brief executive session.
The board accepted the resignation of Tad Heitkamp and Cory Buchholz from their coaching duties for boys' basketball, and the board accepted their resignation. Board member Tana Clark moved for an official thank you to them for the work they have done in that program and the board concurred.
The first discussion item approving the contract with Mammoth Sports for repairs and improvements at the athletic complex. Supt. Johnson noted that the contract did have provisions to protect the school and to ensure the project was completed by the August 1st deadline, with liquidated damages to be assessed if it was not.
While the project is ongoing, the board will receive regular updates to the project twice a month. Johnson will manage the day to day issues, unless there is a major problem that would require a change order to the project. The board voted to approve said contract.
Next, they discussed a renewal of their contract with Infrastructure Design Group for administrative services in overseeing said construction. Supt. Johnson argued that, since Infrastructure is extremely familiar with the field and its design as well as the overall goals of the district, it makes sense to hire them to oversee the details.
Board member Jodi Gloe said that from her work as a city councilwoman, it was best to have an engineer oversee all projects as a safeguard to the money being invested. Supt. Johnson said that, as he’s not an engineer himself, he trusted the staff at Infrastructure as overseers to ensure the contractors meet their obligations. The board had no qualms about this and voted to do so.
Next, the board discussed sending board member delegates to each city, town and township equalization meeting to act as the board’s liaison during tax equalization deliberations.
With that complete, the board discussed the Girls on the Run program, weighing whether they should give this extra-curricular an exemption under policy KG. Normally the school does not charge for participation in events, but Supt. Johnson said that this program is a good exception to that rule.
The program began on March 7th, so if the board didn’t wish to grant this exception the program would be canceled right away.
Several board members as well as Elementary Principal Katie Hoekman testified in favor of the program. It was an easy vote for the board members to make in favor of giving the Girls on the Run program an exception.
Extended school year due to snow days
The next discussion item was about extending the school calendar to make up for snow days. This discussion was not so easy, and in fact, may have been the most contentious issue of the evening.
Supt. Johnson stated that, so far, the school has had 9 snow days this year. It’s been one of the highest snowfalls and deepest cold winters on record in some time. The school calendar had two snow days built into it from the outset, and because of a mistake in the calendar, one extra day had been added, so three of those nine days could simply be written off.
Where it gets complicated is that a little more than a decade ago, the legislature changed the rules for the school to record classroom hours rather than school days.
Meanwhile, teacher schedules are set according to an exemption from the Department of Labor for a certain number of contracted days.
This means a solution must be found that gives the teachers their number of contract days to completion and also gets the number of teaching hours necessary to satisfy the State Department of Education.
Supt. Johnson said that, at this time, they had wiggle room of about only 3 days and laid out a number of potential solutions and his recommendations.
The first option was that with the plan the board approved for this calendar year, they could move the end of school to Thursday, May 25th for students and May 26th for teachers.
Board member Gloe had concerns about seniors and graduation and Johnson stated the graduation date would not be moved or affected. According to state law, once seniors have graduated, they have completed their education and are not required to return to school.
Another solution discussed was eliminating the remaining vacation days set into the schedule. Board president Nordstrom didn’t feel that was a good solution, as families have planned their schedules around those days.
They also talked about the possibility of snow days becoming e-learning days, but that had too many problems.
First, the State Department of Education has said they wouldn’t recognize packet learning, like that done in the pandemic for the elementary, as a viable option. Also, attendance is a large potential issue, as the students would have to log on. It would also necessitate that teachers keep an up-to-date lesson plan that can go online on short notice, essentially forcing them to double-plan. This was a solution that Supt. Johnson didn’t feel was viable.
Wednesday program reduces D's 75%
Another solution floated was the elimination of early dismissal on Wednesday to use as class time to make up those days.
Supt. Johnson didn’t feel that was a viable solution either, and presented results of a teacher and certified staff survey about the program.
Ninety-two percent of staff said that early dismissal Wednesday either agreed or strongly agreed that the time spent in that student support program on Wednesdays is a good use of their time, and 100 percent of those surveyed said that the programming has helped struggling students. Supt. Johnson also showed the raw data from the last two years of running this program, and in summary, at all levels of student education, grades for the struggling students have improved significantly. He noted this program’s numbers speak for themselves as to how successful it has been. The main point was that 75 percent of students receiving a D grade had improved to passing, which Johnson said was absolutely amazing and wonderful.
“These numbers show an impressive reduction of failing grades,” Johnson said. “But to do this, our teachers need time to make it happen, so I don’t see the merit in taking that time away and reducing the quality of education we provide and sacrificing the progress these students have made by eliminating that time we’ve set aside, especially since we already have a solution to the problem built into the calendar by extending the school year.”
Board member Clark agreed that this was excellent, but wondered if a different time could be set aside for this program. She made the argument that such programs at other schools, such as the one she works for, manage it differently. She asked how much student/teacher time could be made up if Wednesdays were switched back to regular days for the rest of the year and wondered if the teachers couldn’t be asked to move the planning for the program to after school on a Tuesday night, as an example. She said she would like to have teachers appear before the board to ask them these questions.
Supt. Johnson said he didn’t have the numbers broken down or prepared as to what classroom hours could be gained by moving Wednesdays back to full days. He said that the teachers have already been asked about this issue, and that the vast majority of them are in favor of the student support program as is, and that it has had the aforementioned results of positive student outcomes. He also counter-argued that eliminating that staff time on Wednesdays would reduce teacher participation in the student support program, as many teachers also have coaching and extra-curricular positions that would interfere. Johnson further argued that this discussion was inappropriate, and would be outside the purview of the school board, as they have set and voted on the calendar year, and already set the provisions as to how snow days will be made up.
The discussion became heated at this time, with definite tension across the table. Board president Nordstrom brought the matter to a close by asking Johnson to provide an estimate as to what classroom hours could be made up if early dismissals on Wednesdays were canceled, but he also acknowledged that the calendar issue had been voted on and set by board vote. Since that had been enacted, they should get out of the way and allow the administration to administer and make daily decisions for the district. With the winter weather being what it has been this year, it’s distinctly possible that more snow days will be coming.
The board then reviewed and approved the driver’s education program for the summer months, with a slight increase in price of $250 per Garretson district student and $310 for non-Garretson students. The program will start on June 5th and have the same teacher as last year.
Next was policy items up for review and changes. Supt. Johnson said that the school’s use of computers and computer networks and webpage development aspects of computer classes hadn’t been revisited since about 2005, and were woefully out of date. The committee would have recommendations for the board at the next meeting.
Results from the school’s accreditation process have formulated into a new policy for professional growth and standards, including annual reviews and evaluations of staff. This will bring the school policy to the recommended policies by the State Department of Education. The board approved minor changes to school admissions policies and student supervision policies, also to comply with state recommendations.
The board then moved onto administrative reports, and Katie Hoekman and Chris McGregor gave recaps of the events of the last month to the board on their areas.
Hoekman’s report was a little longer than McGregor’s as she was shopping for the best curriculum possible for the district, saying that most providers want to lock the school into 5-6 year agreements. However, she’d been advised that using pilot programs for new curriculum was a great way to get new and cutting-edge content for students while at the same time saving money on budget allocations, getting the best content for the best prices.
Board president Nordstrom asked how quick the turnover rate is for purchasing new curriculum content and placing it in action. Supt. Johnson responded that it’s usually ordered toward the end of a school year, and the expectation is that the material arrives during the tail end of the year or summer break, and it can be in classrooms by the start of the next school year.
Election details finalized for March 21
Supt. Johnson gave his report next, but he yielded the floor to school business manager Jacob Schweitzer first.
Schweitzer gave an election update. As of the printing of this newspaper all legal notices regarding the election will have been published including sample ballots, notice of election, notice of voter registration and notice of taxation increase.
March 6th was the last day to register to vote. If you had not done so, that deadline has passed. Absentee and early voting can be done up to election day and the process is simple, Schweitzer said. So far, he’s helped 12 requests for absentee ballots.
Directly addressing board member Clark’s earlier question, he said that the county requires a simple form to be submitted by the voter for an absentee ballot and once received and approved he can provide them with said ballot. Early voting is even easier, he said, as voters merely need to come to the school office. After Schweitzer makes a quick check with the county on the voter registration, the individual can cast their ballot. Both absentee and early voting ballots are securely stored, to be counted by the election workers on election day.
Clark said that the couple who’d asked her about absentee voting might choose to do the early voting instead.
Schweitzer reported that four election workers have been hired to man the polls from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on March 21st, and that he will be present in a supervisory role, but not counting ballots himself.
Supt. Johnson reported on a small informal gathering they hosted at Annie’s Coffee with some teachers for a question-and-answer session about the opt out, and though it was only sparsely attended, he felt that it was a good discussion.
Clark had also noted that she had been asked if there were more public forums to be held about the opt out, and Supt. Johnson said that they hadn’t planned any at this time.
Supt. Johnson also reported on his attendance of the National Superintendent’s conference, and gave his summary of those events.
What really surprised him was a seminar held on electric buses, and the EPA representative giving a report on their effectiveness.
After investigating much of this issue because of the grant our district was given, at this conference he was informed that thirty-eight states already are using them and that they are very popular in Quebec, Canada, a province not known for mild snowfalls or warm winters. Not only have they been very successful, they’re eager to add more to the fleets.
The only cautionary is that the energy provider must have the infrastructure to be able to be able to handle the power load. This, he said, assuaged many of the lingering trepidations he might have had about adding them to the Garretson district fleet.
Supt. Johnson was also pleased to report to the board that the legislature has moved to make a seven percent increase in teacher pay allocations this fiscal year, and that though the governor has threated to veto it, he’s happy that a large percentage of legislators recognized that a five percent increase in teacher salary was simply not adequate this year.
Other than regular payment of bills there was nothing of note from either board member Gloe or Johnson about the Prairie Lakes Coop, and so the board entered executive session at 7:24 for that aforementioned personnel discussion. Afterwards, they accepted the resignation of Heitkamp and Buchholz as basketball coaches, and issued their formal thank you, adjourning by 8 p.m.
The next regular meeting of the Garretson School board will be held on April 10 at 5:45 p.m. at the school library.
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