February Board Meeting Review

The February board meeting was a fairly light agenda.

The board approved a change in high school Industrial Technology courses as presented by Mr. Coblentz. Many of you may remember the old "industrial arts" courses. In many schools such as ours the old technology still exists and some of the curriculum remains similar. Mr. Coblentz and Mr. McAdams are willing to attend two weeks of intensive summer training for several years in order to teach a series of courses called Project Lead The Way. This series of courses is designed to appeal to engineering students or other advanced math and science students to give them a taste of engineering skills in a "hands on" format. This will replace some of our existing Industrial Arts type courses. It should not require new staff and there are financial state grants to support the technology needs and training costs. Special thanks go to Jamie and Allen for their willingness to go the extra mile to provide exciting new opportunities for students!

The big topic of course was the discussion on state and local finance issues. I presented a slide show on the state's fiscal woes and explained the financial impact.

The bottom line is simple. We must cut at least $175,000 this year.

Tough times. We hope you will be patient through the months that lie ahead.

We are taking every measure possible to limit the effect on children.

As part of our attempts to communicate better we will begin posting the board agendas and the board minutes on our websites so that you can stay informed.

If you put this blog site on your favorites list you will be able to check in each week to see the postings and each month you can be linked to the school board meeting minutes to see who retired and who said what. Once the site is operational (this week we hope) you can read the actual minutes instead of just the newspaper version!