The Broadus School Board Trustees met for their regular monthly meeting on Monday, with all members in attendance; Trustee Shasta Madsen attended the meeting via phone call. 20 members of the community were also in attendance at the beginning of the meeting.
During the hearing of the public, five high school young men spoke to the board in support of hiring Brett Emmons as head football coach – hiring for that position is scheduled to be conducted later this week.
The Math Curriculum Committee, consisting of HS Teachers Eric Myers and Chrystal Mitchell, along with Elementary Teachers Jennifer Zellers and Caroline Johnson met with the board. The committee spoke on the need for updated math curriculum; many of the books currently used are from the early 2000s, and the books are difficult to replace as they are no longer in print; the committee discussed having to purchase books off of eBay to replace damaged texts. Newer curriculum is moving to more of a computer based model, often with workbooks for the students, and with every student currently operating a Chromebook tablet, a more technology based learning option is well within reason.
One option would be to go with the current Saxon math curriculum, but the committee presented evidence from nonprofit group edreports.org showing that Saxon consistently ranked towards the bottom of available math curriculum options in a number of factors. Several other options were discussed, with the committee looking to use the Bridges system in K-5, and then going to the Glenco system for subsequent grades. The board asked the committee about the learning curve in learning a new system, which was admittedly a factor in any major programming change, but over the long term math competence is likely to rise with the better curriculum. The cost for replacement of all the math curriculum from K-12, including pre-calculus would be in the $27,000 range. The board is expected to make a decision on the new curriculum in the coming months.
Jay Schroeder, new board trustee, took his oath of office and was seated with the board.
Trustees Amanda Zimmer and Rob Jones also took their oaths of office, and Waylon Billing was appointed to a one year term to fill the seat vacated by Patrick Emmons.
Trustee Zimmer was nominated as Board Chair, with Rob Jones nominated as Vice Chair; both were voted in with no dissenting votes.
Committees were reformed, with Schroeder added to a number of boards vacated by Emmons.
Dixie Mitchell was then appointed as District Clerk.
During the hiring and resignation portion of the evening, the board voted to hire Cody Earley as Summer School Teacher, and also to fill the sixth grade teacher position during an unpaid one year leave of absence from Caroline Johnson.
The board also accepted the resignation effective the end of the school year from Clayton Scott, VoEd Teacher and FFA Advisor.
Next on the agenda was the opening of bids for the East Powderville and Ashland bus routes.
Two bids came in for each route. The first bid opened for the East Powderville route was from John Blain, with a five year bid at $3.02 per mile along the 128 mile route, totaling $68,421.12 per year. The second bid for that route came from Ty and Trish Robinson, with a five year bid at $2.84 per mile, totaling $64,343.04 per year.
A bid from Warren Wash for the Ashland route was opened, with a five year bid at $3.06 along the 184 mile route, totaling $99,658.08. The final bid came from John Robinson, a five year bid for the Ashland route at $3.47 per mile, totaling $113,010.96 per year.
All bids were for the new 177 day school calendar.
The board noted a letter that had been sent to board members from the school’s attorney commenting on their responsibilities as a board in accepting a responsible bid.
A motion was made to accept the bids of John Blain for the East Powderville route, and John Robinson for the Ashland route. The vote totaled four in favor of the motion, three votes against, and the motion passed.
Next on the agenda, the board discussed the declaration of an emergency day to make up for one of the school days missed in April due to storms. This declaration, enshrined in Montana law, gives trustees the ability to declare school closed for one day due to unforeseen emergencies with no loss in base aid for that day of instruction.
Superintendent Hansen discussed the matter, noting that the school will still have to make up some hours before the end of the school year. The board then voted to enact the emergency declaration for the missed day, and to make up hours by changing the IPI early out days this Friday and next into regular school days, effectively giving two more hours of instruction. The schedule for the elementary track meet this Friday will be likely be tweaked to fit with the extended day.
The board then performed the first reading on a number of MSBA Board policy updates, which are a yearly occurrence as board policies are pushed down from the state level.
The trustees discussed the salary and benefits for classified employees, particularly honing in on the unique situation of Head Maintenance and IT Tech Levi Mitchell, who splits his time working and fixing anything and everything at the school from boilers to sewer systems to vehicle repair, while also maintaining the hardware for the wide variety of computers, tablets, and other electronics at the school. In many schools this task would be handled by two separate full-time employees, but Levi is able to handle both jobs, and was requesting a raise for his additional duties; his last raise came in 2012 and the tech at the school has evolved significantly over that time period. Mitchell commented that the school has 250 computers and 430 devices in total, and he maintains and repairs all those devices. He noted that after the purchase of Chromebooks for each student, he has been able to replace screens and other parts, sometimes parting-out those that were beyond repair to fix others, and has been able to do so without sending any back in to the factory.
Additionally, $8,000 has been freed up by not renewing a contract for in-person tech support, as it was determined that Mitchell was essentially taking care of those tasks without a need for someone to come down.
A raise of 3% for all classified employees to match that of certified staff was already in the works, with the board voting to give Mitchell a $2.00 an hour raise for his duties.
As the evening wound to a close, Principal Denise Ternes noted during her report that 21 kids had been to the Kindergarten Roundup on Monday; some of that group would potentially stay in pre-school next year.
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