Whew! The November school board meeting had lots to report! Let’s dig right in! As always, you can view the agenda and items discussed here.
First, we heard from our auditors. Our audit report came back with no material weaknesses (the worst offenses!). We had two “significant deficiencies.” One was no surprise, and it was a concern over the segregation of duties over financial reporting mechanisms. This is largely because of our small district size – but we did work to address some of these concerns last year. The second was a deficiency in verification of free and reduced lunch applications. Increased training around those who are filling and checking these applications has begun to ensure the right verdict is reached. Overall, these findings don’t worry me too much – and as with everything – in a small district – we are continually learning and adapting as needed. Second, we heard from Lorenzo at Stifel, who presented on our bonding capacity information. In a nutshell, our bond rating as a district is “A+” – the third highest rating. In 2015, with our fiscal reserves falling below 20% (at 15.5%), our rating was downgraded to this rating from “AA-.” There is a potential for this bond rating to be raised from A+ to AA- again with our 2017 reserves back over 20% as a district. It is worth noting that even with our lower A+ rating, only 25% of the 181 districts that have an underlying rating by the S&P have a higher rating than us. Lorenzo then reported on our bonding capacity. For tax year 2017 (debt year 2018), we have a total debt capacity of $12.2 million. We have $4.9 million in outstanding bonds (principal only), leaving us with $7.2 million + the cash in our debt service account which leaves us with a total capacity of bonding to $8 million. This was expected by our previous estimates as we move forward with our architectural firm to design propose our initiative to come before the voters in April 2018. We spent some time in lengthy discussions on the District Reports. We discussed the APR (Annual Performance Report) results from our DESE scores, which dropped from a 95.4% to 88.6%. This drop can be traced to the performance of our ‘subgroup’ students, which are our kiddos with IEPs, ELL, and Free & Reduced Lunch. Basically, if you track attendance of the Free Lunch population, had attendance rates between 6%-20% lower than the non-Free Lunch population. You can see by the breakdown here, that our Free & Reduced Lunch population scores significantly lower in the proficient/advanced categories of the MAP tests. This is what needs to be addressed. As these populations in our district grow, we will need to consider pouring more resources into these areas. As we look ahead to next year, we are hopeful for a slight increase, but still realizing our science scores will remain low due to our curriculum not being aligned with the tests (but should be in a few years). So, all of this to say what? Standardized testing is both good and bad. It gives us a benchmark. But is this benchmark a fool-proof way to determine how well our district is doing? Nope. For example, our average ACT score increased to 19.9 from 19.0 a year ago, a 5% increase. Is this spinning numbers and perspective? Not really. There are severe limitations to all of this. Is it good enough? No. It’s our stated goal to be the top 5% of our APR range – and a score of 88.6 doesn’t get us there. However, moving the needle will take not just more student support – but administrative support to systematically ensure we are using best practices throughout our district. We also the spent some time discussing possible administrative additions. This will be met with some stiff resistance among the community. However, I would encourage those who would be opposed to spend some time asking Mr. Downs or any of the administrators to provide an example of something they needed to fill out to the state or federal government that took their time away from working to make teachers better and in turn, help our kids improve. I’ve already noted my concerns regarding the lack of curriculum and instruction systematic improvements with leaving the assistant superintendent position open. During our meeting, we discussed options Mr. Downs brought up before the board and are available online here. We also discussed these in relation to OPS and our maintenance/custodial work. We are still highly concerned with various aspects of OPS’ work. At the end of the day, my personal opinion is that it will likely be (although I don’t have hard data) more expensive to do this in-house, but I would hope we could create an environment where pride of work is higher than it is now. Although, we’ll likely never be 100% satisfied here. We then discussed the Greg Cotton scoreboard donation and approved accepting this and purchasing it. Donations like this and the purchase that we approved of a Gator this month or continued approval of funds being spent on the cheer-trip can be deceiving. These were parts of ongoing conversations that are tied to specific donations or expenses that are covered by participants. The district is not spending this money out of its own budget as it would look like here. Remember, the board only approves and sees expenses – and doesn’t see the specific income. In relation to the scoreboard, I hope and expect we will do justice in honoring Greg and the Cotton family commitment to Hallsville schools. I will end this blog. If you have any other question about the November meeting, let me know. We discussed a ton of things. I didn’t feel well throughout the meeting but powered-through. I hope you will all come to the listening session next Monday, Nov. 27th to provide input into the bond initiative. Until next time, Happy Thanksgiving! PS: If you hadn’t heard, an update on the Governor’s attempt to fire the Commissioner of Education – this attempt failed. An update can be found here and here.
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For those of you in the educational field, you know there has been lots of discussion surrounding the State Board of Education. I want to help everyone (including myself) breakdown why this is important stuff. First -- some quick background:
First, what is the State Board of Education? You can find their specific duties here but in a nutshell, they appoint the Commissioner of Education, accredit school districts (like ours), establish testing requirements, and create the bus safety regulations (amongst other duties). Who are the State Board members? They are appointed members by the Governor, confirmed by the state senate, no more than four members can be of one political party (8 total members). Now, to the political stuff. Governor Greitens, as any governor would, has been appointing members to various boards and commissions across the state, including the State Board. In doing so, Gov. Greitens has made it clear in his education agenda that he wants to expand the presence of charter schools across Missouri. A good article on "what is" a charter school, can be found here. In recent action, three of Gov. Greiten's new appointees are understood to be very pro-charter school expansion across the state. The previous State Board of Education took a slightly more conservative approach to dealing with charter schools -- holding them to similar accountability standards to the public schools. These new members are presumed to want to loosen this significantly, and their assumed first major step appears to (by public agendas) replace/fire Commissioner Vandeven from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Legislators are coming to Commissioner Vandeven's support and can be found here, here, and here. The potential ramifications for public school districts like Hallsville are related to funding and policy. If the state makes a shift away from public schools and opens the door to charter schools, this creates a 'feeding frenzy' toward them wanting public support (state dollars). Let me be clear, there is a role and place for charter schools across the country and Missouri. In relatively rural Missouri and in Hallsville, where our testing scores and academic outcomes are successful -- there should be no need for charter schools unless extenuating circumstances would exist. In the past, the State Board has looked at charter schools with critical eyes, rightfully so. Charter schools do not have elected school boards, are often ran by outside organizations, and research is very mixed on their success when compared to public or traditional private schools. The State Board should look as critically at them as they do the Public Schools--or even more. What's the fuss about? Well, Gov. Greitens trying to accomplish this charter school expansion, I believe, the wrong way. Five of the State Board members have not received confirmation from the state senate yet--and they already want to oust a widely respected Commissioner of Education. This effort began back in September and has continued. Gov. Greitens has withdrawn his own previous nominee to the State Board because she disagreed with him on this issue. Now, the State Board has scheduled a meeting for Nov 21st to discuss personnel. Interesting date - Tuesday of Thanksgiving week -- or in other words: a slow news cycle to hope it blows over quickly. I have sent an email to the State Board and copied Sen. Rowden, Rep. Reisch, and tried to send an email to Gov. Greitens for which I've had previous email conversation with him on, which was returned as undeliverable. Since I was unable to email Gov. Greitens, I called the Governor's Office. I've asked Sen. Rowden to ask tough questions of the motivations behind the urgency of these appointees who haven't been granted senate confirmation yet. For Gov. Greitens, I have asked that he not withdraw Tim Sumners name from consideration as a State Board member due to his stated concern of moving in the direction to remove the commissioner. It's concerning to see such great lengths being taken to make significant changes to Missouri education leadership in swift manners. Remember, the Commissioner of Education has been apolitical, above partisanship, until now. To prove that, over the last 30 years, we have only had 4 commissioners of education (including Commissioner Vandeven). If you feel compelled and concerned, you can reach the State Board of Education at sbe@dese.mo.gov and Gov. Greitens' office at: 573-751-3222 to voice your concerns. Remember folks, I was a lobbyist. I enjoy the policy making process to improve ourselves. These actions are not to improve our education system but to rush and sneak a drastic policy change in our public education. In these articles, Gov. Greitens' spokesperson says that funding has increased but they have not seen a 'corresponding performance increase.' This is good talking points, except Gov. Greitens' has approved and signed into law one year of funding increases that began July 1. Have there been any standardized testing to show this 'corresponding performance increase' since his slight funding increase? Nope. Smooth talking at its finest. Now, if I can be real for a moment, performance increases take so much more than funding increases. It takes work at home by families to provide stable homes. It takes work at school by teachers, staff, and administrators to provide quality education environments with the best curriculum and it takes work by the students to have a desire to learn. And yes, it takes work by the elected officials to properly fund education. If we have all of those, will we see performance increase? You bet. Gov. Greitens has a PhD from Oxford and he knows that this performance increases take more than just money. This answer is just for those of you out there who want easy answers and can believe talking points. I'm here to tell you there isn't easy answers to fixing and improving our education system. It isn't perfect, but ousting a respected leader by Democrats and Republicans alike ain't the way to implement change, Governor. Thanks for reading! The school board, tonight, took some exciting steps forward!
Tonight, we met in a special board meeting to approve a contract with Klingner & Associates, P.C. to move forward as our architectural firm as we work toward developing a no-tax-increase bond to be on April 2018's ballot. This process began in early August, when we agreed to put out an RFQ. Twelve responses were received and ranked. The board interviewed the top 4 teams as we ranked them. Klingner was our top rated firm and negotiations between the Hallsville School District and Klingner began and progressed to where both sides (our district contract attorney included) feel comfortable about moving forward. What does this mean in real terms? Klingner will provide architectural work, be at community forums to listen to our input, and provide plans that will be ultimately what we hope to put on the April 2018 ballot for your consideration. Klingner will be paid a fee for the pre-bond work and then negotiations will reoccur after potential bond approval for some specific services (not to exceed 8% of the total bonding cost). Our contract attorney and review of other bonds (ie when the Primary building was built) and board expertise (shout-out to Bryan Wildenhain) all agree that these one-time and potential total costs lie well within industry standards. Klingner has done work in similar-sized districts including CLark Couty R-1 and Knox County R-1 in the scope of $2-3 million, but also multiple projects in Quincy's Public School. They have an office in Columbia. In their interview, they provided sketches and ideas that encouraged me that they would think outside-the-box to solve our problems, stay within our price-constraints, and provide quality work as an all-include firm. What are we looking at doing? Initially, we are prioritizing a classroom wing at the Primary building (2nd grade) and a gymnasium (remember, there is a café-nasium currently at the Primary building). In addition, we hope to consider renovations of the middle school, potentially the track, and perhaps some one-time maintenance projects. The ultimate proposal (the bond) will be shaped by community input, assessing and prioritizing our needs internally, and we will do what's best for our kids. What are we looking at, bond-wise? We will discuss this at our next meeting (Nov 20), but we estimate we have bonding capacity at a no-tax increase level of approximately $8 million. We hope you will stay engaged with us during these processes. We will hold 3 public meetings to discuss this specific issue: November 27th, December 18th, and January 8th. We invite you to one or all of the meetings to listen and offer input and ultimately, we will be asking for your support for the bond in April 2018. If you are unable to make the meetings and have input, I know (or any of the board members) will be happy to hear your thoughts! Until Next Time, Craig |
AuthorHallsville resident. Foster Parent. School board member. Politico. Jesus Follower. Cardinals Fan #MizzouMade Archives
June 2020
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