HHS teachers ask for revision in handbook
Unified School District 410 Board of Education met for its regularly scheduled meeting Monday evening. Items on the agenda included reports from elementary, middle, and high school principals, activities director, and Marion County Special Education Cooperative director, Fred Miller. The board also dealt with policy issues, Trojan After Prom Party committee, supplemental and principal contracts, and other reports.
HHS social science teacher and Building Improvement Team chairman Jim Robb addressed the board and asked for a revision of school policy regarding make-up work. He said that the current policy wording left room for interpretation of when work was due. He requested that the policy be changed to state that a student would be allowed a maximum of two class meetings prior to the due date, and if not completed on the date set as due, a record of zero would be assigned.
Robb and high school principal, Dale Honeck, said they had been testing the new policy in the high school for a month, and it had been working well.
Superintendent Gordon Mohn advised Robb and Honeck to continue to use the new policy, to write it out, and get it to the board before the March meeting. The board will vote on the issue at the next meeting.
Robb also asked the board to consider changing the awarding of honor roll status from every nine weeks to every semester.
Gary Andrews and Rod Hamm addressed the board in regard to Trojan After Prom Party (TAPP) liability insurance.
According to Mohn, the school's liability insurance does not appear to cover activities not sponsored by the school. He said that if the board wants to work toward sponsorship of the activity, they could do that, but he felt that TAPP was a success as it is.
"The message I want to make sure we send our after prom party is that we appreciate them," said Mohn.
The problem of liability insurance may never have been an issue because the question was never asked, according to Hamm.
The school district will confirm whether its liability insurance will cover TAPP, and if not, the board plans to help cover the cost of insurance this year along with site council, according to Mohn.
The board approved a supplemental contract for Brent Brockmueller to be an assistant baseball coach. Brockmueller graduated from Tabor College last year and has been working as a para in the Hillsboro school system.
The board also renewed contracts for two years for Evan Yoder, elementary school principal, Corey Burton, middle school principal, Honeck, and Max Heinrichs, activities director.
The bids on the purchase of a new 47-passenger school bus were discussed. Kansas Equipment Co. Inc. Bid $55,838 for a Bluebird bus, and Midwest Bus Sales, Inc. Bid $55,993.07 for a Thomas school bus. The board voted unanimously to approve the purchase of the Bluebird bus.
Mohn reported to the board that the superintendents of TEEN schools had met to coordinate the schools' calendars. The schools set dates for TEEN classes to begin, days off, and other significant dates in order for the students to avoid missing classes.
The school district is going to begin sending out monthly account statements and have balance information on-line in order to facilitate debt collection.
The board discussed the percentage of debt, and the writing off of uncollectible debts.
Mohn presented the board with enrollment and staff projections for the future, informed the board of proposed legislation, and offered possible scenarios for funding.
The district is in the initial stages of considering the possibility of adding all-day kindergarten, and Yoder gave a report citing advantages and disadvantages.
Yoder said that students in all-day kindergarten "gain academically."
The board asked Yoder to return with a proposal of what all-day kindergarten would look like and estimate costs of the program at the March board meeting.
Mohn said the board may make a decision regarding all day-kindergarten in April.
"We could have it in place and ready to implement by the time school starts in August," said Mohn.
The next U.S.D. 410 school board meeting will be at 7 p.m. March 14 in the HHS technology center.
