Haxtun BOE opts to move forward with master plan

It was a long night for the Haxtun Board of Education last Tuesday as the group met first in a work session to discuss the superintendent’s annual evaluation and to review two proposals for a facilities master plan. Following the work session, board members held a near two-hour meeting to conduct business for the month of February. In doing so, the local board of education hired staff for next year, accepted a resignation from Havilah Andersen and approved a lengthy list of coaches for the spring season.

As the first item of business in the February meeting of the Haxtun Board of Education, board members voted to approve the evaluation of Superintendent Marsha Cody. Cody is in her second year at Haxtun Schools.

School Board President Amy Kilgour said Cody is doing “really” well in her role and that communication is a strong point. Kilgour said Cody is visible in the community and with school activities on social media and continues to build on board policy and staff accountability within the District.

On the flip side, Kilgour said the Board would like Cody to continue to work on communication with the community outside of social media to target those who are not online and to focus on individual communication staff and parents, when necessary.

“The discussion went really well,” Kilgour said when recapping the review of the superintendent’s evaluation in work session. “We gave her things to work on.” Kilgour also said Cody has a number of strengths and the Board saw great growth from last year’s evaluation discussion.

While in the work session, board members reviewed two proposals for a facilities master plan. Recently, the Haxtun Education Foundation and the Haxtun Lions Club have partnered to begin fundraising efforts for a new auxiliary gym. Hopes are the gym space would also allow for a weight room accessible to the public. However, the first step in doing so is developing a facilities master plan for the Haxtun School District.

“The Haxtun School District is excited about working with the Haxtun Education Foundation, the Boosters and the Lions Club to support a community recreation center. It is definitely needed!” the District said recently in a Facebook post announcing an upcoming fundraising event. “However, prior to developing official plans, Haxtun School District needs to engage in developing a Facilities Master Plan, so the location of the auxiliary gym is placed with future needs in mind. The Facility Master Plan will also incorporate the renovations, additions and improvements needed to make sure Haxtun students have the facilities they need in the future.”

Following discussion, the Board of Education voted to approve a proposal from Wold Architects and Engineers to develop the master plan.

In the statement of work, detailed in the proposal, objectives will be to assist Haxtun Schools with a master plan that will identify, analyze and prioritize facility needs, short term and long term, while considering the following: architectural, mechanical, electrical review and incorporation of Colorado Department of Education assessments, educational programing, cost estimates for capital planning, demographic data, enrollment projects and facility capacity analysis, community input, district personnel input and funding sources and support.

The District plans to move forward with Wold immediately since the proposal, expected not to exceed $20,000, was approved last week.

For continued updates on the quest for an auxiliary gym, follow Haxtun Community Auxiliary Gym an Weightroom Project on Facebook and watch future editions of the Herald.

In other business the Board:

• Agreed to divest control of the Kurtzer Scholarship Certificate of Deposit to the Kurtzer family to do with as they see fit;

• Approved revisions to the extra duty salary schedule to move vocational leaders to the same step as a head coach, removing the athletic director line and adding an administrator on-duty amount;

• Hired Don Myers as athletic director. Myers will replace Rich Gerk who plans to retire this year. His contract will include an extension to reflect two hours per day for athletic director duties. Myers is also the high school science teacher;

• Approved Lisa Atkins as a long-term substitute teacher for high school English;

• Approved Havilah Andersen’s resignation as junior high science teacher effective at the end of the 2022-23 school year;

• Approved Dave Shafer as a secondary social studies teacher for next year;

• Approved a principal contract for Becky Heinz for 2023-24;

• Approved snow days and late start days for the month of January and set a Monday school day for April 24;

• Approved Amanda Brown as a substitute teacher for K-6 music;

• Hired Holly Kurtzer as a substitute custodian;

• Approved the following list of spring coaches: junior high track, co-head coaches Jared Anderson and Noah Toops; high school track, Jared Anderson as head coach, Don Myers and Noah Toops as assistant coaches and Colton Salyards as a volunteer coach; high school baseball, Trent Ham, head coach, Ryan Nolan, assistant coach, and Rob Martinez, a volunteer coach.