by Garrick A. Moritz, Editor
The Garretson School board met in regular session on May 11, 2020 at 5:45 p.m. Again, because of the pandemic they met via videoconference, allowing the press to watch in the school’s lunchroom commons area on the large screen television and broadcasting live on the school’s Alliance public access television channel.
After convening, the board added one item to the agenda, a change order for the upcoming school roofing project, and then approved the agenda.
One big item of note was the resignation of Francis Ruml. Supt. Guy Johnson said that Ruml has accepted a position in his home town district of Howard, S.D. Board president Nordstrom said that he was sad to see Ruml go, and the board formally thanked him for his years of service as a teacher and coach and wished him all the best in his new job back in his hometown.
Elizabeth Etrheim also resigned from her extra-curricular assignment as a junior high volleyball coach as she is instead going to become the new cheerleading coordinator, and that those positions would directly conflict with each other. New teacher Jeena Lentz, who was hired at the last meeting, is a volleyball enthusiast. Supt. Johnson said that this was a problem that solved itself and that she’ll be taking over as a junior high volleyball coach.
There was no old business, and so the board proceeded to new business. First item of note was setting the preliminary budget for 2020-2021. The outcome of what the state may, or may not do is in serious question at this time. With the pandemic, there has been talk of a special session of the legislature to redo the state’s budget, which could drastically change the school’s budgetary plans for not just Garretson, but every district throughout the state. Board President Nordstrom said that the latest rumblings he had heard was that there might not be a special session and therefore no changes, but he said that holding off planning a preliminary budget might be a good idea for now. They set that preliminary budgetary hearing for July 13, at 6 p.m. with the plan to adopt a budget by the September Meeting.
The board approved the contracts pending for next year’s staff.
The board then addressed business from the (SDHSAA) South Dakota High School Activities Association. First, they voted to join the association for the next school year and voted for Heath Larson of Chester Area School District as an East River at large representative position, Dan Conrad of Sioux Falls Washington for Division 1 representative, and Marty Weismantel of Groton for small school group board of Education representative. They voted yes on amendment #1 to the SDHSAA constitution that reduces the number of required practice days (from 10 days to 5 days) required for teams to play in SDHSAA events.
At the recommendation of SDHSAA, they also adopted a new policy involving school physicals. Garretson’s policy is for annual school physicals, but state requirements are only once every 3 years. Usually the school has medical professionals in the building to perform these physicals for all. With no students in the building, and no possibility that this would be likely for this school year and difficult at best for next year, the administration proposed that this policy be temporarily lapsed for a year. The board agreed, and voted to do so.
The school board then made a calendar change for next year for The Dakota Players (aka the Children’s Theater Company of South Dakota). A scheduling conflict was discovered with Parent-Teacher conferences and the Dakota Players’ schedule. He requested to the board a change in the calendar to move PT conferences to the week after on Nov. 9th. Supt. Johnson said that they really want to take advantage of this program, as it has an excellent reputation across the state. The board agreed, and voted to make the recommended changes to the school calendar.
Next the board discussed going paperless. Supt. Johnson said that it’s no secret that preparing the board’s packets is no joke, 8 inches of paper, think binders and cost of postage if it needs to be mailed. It was discussed last year about this time before about going paperless and he felt it was time to bring it up again.
Board President Nordstrom said he was actually excited about the prospect. With using computers to do so much already lately for just having their meeting, maybe it was time to go for the whole hog.
The basic idea would be to provide each board member with a school iPad, and that the tech coordinator would train each board member how to use it and how to manage the files. Supt. Johnson said that the basic problem before was that there was no optical character recognition software in the previous equipment the school had, but now with their new printers and scanners, that was no longer an issue. Pages of documents could be scanned into easily readable and writable formats in PDF for the board to access and use. Supt. Johnson said that they might be able to implement this by the next school year if the board green-lit making the plan.
There were no objections from anyone on the board, and even some enthusiasm on giving this a try.
The board moved on to policy reviews, starting with an initial informational briefing on policies on gifts to the school, public solicitation and advertising in the school, and distribution of promotional materials for the school. The board reviewed health and safety policies, and staff participation in political activities policy. They had a second reading of communicable diseases policies, use of alcohol and drugs polices, handbook changes, attendance at state events policies and expense reimbursement policies. The board spent the most time reviewing the alcohol and drug polices as regards to staff members, with board member Rachel Hanisch (who it should be noted is an attorney) clarifying the policy and making word choice corrections. The board approved these policies with the amendments that Hanisch recommended.
The next item was the added agenda item of a change order to the roofing project. Supt. Johnson said that unlike many change orders to projects, this one had no cost. The company merely wanted to get started on the project early. He said they would have started immediately if they’d been allowed to do so, but he felt that it would be too early to get working as there are still teachers in the building finishing with end of year tasks as well as the HVAC and lighting project going on that might get in the way. After negotiating with the company, they selected June 15 as the start date for the roofing project and the board agreed to that.
The board then received an update from School Business Manager Jacob Schweitzer about the RFP for a food service company. He said that companies interested in filing for the RFP have until the 21st to submit questions and until June 1st to submit proposals. He had heard from 3 companies so far, including the previous company to hold the contract before Thrive, Lunchtime Solutions. He hoped this would result in favorable bid conditions for the school.
The board then heard administrative reports on Year-End planning from the two principals. Elementary Principal Teresa Hulscher began by telling the board that the last student work packet pickup was Friday, May 8, and that things are wrapping up in the elementary. She said that they are planning a farewell parade to happen next week, Tuesday, May 19, on what would have been the last day of school, at 6:30 p.m. All teachers and staff, including kitchen staff and bus drivers would be joining a parade through town to wave goodbye to students for the end of the year. She hoped it would bring some closure and goodwill to everybody in what has been a difficult end of the year for everyone.
As to summer programs, such as the Reading Bridge, ESY and summer school, she has no idea if those programs can or will go forward this year, though she hopes that they can be done in July if possible. There was no kindergarten round-up this year because of the pandemic, but she likewise hopes to host a kindergarten open house in August instead.
Principal Chris Long gave his report for the Middle School and High School end of things. He said that his expectations were that the end of the year this year would be less hectic than usual what with students not actually being in the building. He said this has not proved to be the case at all and concluded that the end of the year is always hectic, period. A virtual academic awards program will be held on Tuesday, May 12 and broadcast on the Alliance Public Access Channel, as well as being posted on the school’s website and YouTube for the world to see. He was working with teachers and students to get a reasonable schedule to turn in textbooks and iPads. Long was pleased to report that the MAP assessments that were held had a 96 percent rate, better than last year when students were actually in the building! He also said that about 90 percent of students had completed their assignments for the year and that teachers were focusing with the remaining 10 percent to get the final items concluded. He said he planned to issue no failing grades for this quarter, instead choosing to mark any incomplete work as incomplete and, if necessary, to use ICU time at the beginning of next year for remediation for any students that needed it.
He said that class registration for next year has started online, but that it won’t be finalized right away. He wants to meet with 8th grade students on an individual basis. Long said that he’s hoping and praying right now that everything can be done as normal by next fall.
The board asked the principals what the plan was if that couldn’t happen.
Hulscher and Long both said that they have been considering plans, should that be the case.
Long said that the distance learning worked because they already had three solid quarters of work in place before the crisis. He said he would have a hard time seeing how a school year could start in a productive way without a traditional start.
“Classrooms need time to build up relationships,” Long said. “A classroom rapport takes time and interaction that you just can’t reproduce digitally. We had that good rapport already, which is why we were able to slide more comfortably into the distance learning I think, the kids knew what their teachers expected of them and they wanted to work. They were invested. I just don’t know if we can replicate that at the start of a new year without being there in person.”
Hulscher said that she likewise hoped next year could start normally. Many ideas have been proposed, from starting later in the year to staggered classrooms with limited student numbers on alternating days. Again, they had to wait and see and hope for the best, that things could begin again somewhere close to normal.
Next, Supt. Johnson took the helm and addressed the board about the HVAC and lighting projects that had already been started. New lights had been installed in the middle school and part of the high school. Next on the list were the lobby, commons, and elementary. The new chiller for the school had been manufactured in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and was on its way to the school now.
Supt. Johnson said there would be change orders coming to the lighting and roofing project as well, but they were not ready to bring those to the board as yet. The root cause is that the roofing height and depth were different for different sections of the building, as they were built at different times, and he discovered that new lighting for the Ag building hadn’t been included at all in the initial plans. That will be rectified soon, and he’d have change orders to bring before the board by the next meeting.
He also reported to the board on the Prairie Lakes Cooperative, but had no news about that coop other than they paid their bills and payroll for the Co-op.
The board did have an executive session at the end of the meeting regarding a personnel matter, but no word was received before print deadlines of this newspaper as to whether any action resulted from that executive session.
