The Haxtun-Fleming Herald - What can we reason but from what we know? -Alexander Pope

A mid-June meeting, while only just over an hour long, packed in a full agenda for the Haxtun Board of Education. Members of the local school board meet on Tuesday, June 20 in the high school board meeting and in doing so, appointed a new board member to fill a seat left vacant by Audree Edwards, opted to move forward with a BEST grant application process, including a bond request at the next regular election, and adopted the 2023-24 budget.

The June meeting opened with the appointment of Ross Edwards to the Haxtun Board of Education. Edwards takes a seat left vacant by his sister-in-law Audree, who resigned from her position on the board to take an employment opportunity with the school district. She plans to serve as a sixth grade teacher and elementary counselor.

Ross Edwards will fill his seat on the board until elections in November. At that time if he wishes to seek a term on the board he may do so by following the general election process.

Other seats, those currently held by Amy Kilgour, Richard Starkebaum, Steven Hadeen and Abby Henry, will also be up for election in November. To run for a seat, candidates will need to complete a nomination packet, including collecting a petition with the signatures of 25 eligible district voters. An official call for nominations will be published by the District later this summer.

Following Edwards’ appointment to the board, Board Member Dean Michael was elected as Board Secretary. Edwards will step in to serve on the Chamber and Accountability committees as a Board representative.

As the first item of business back with a full board, members voted to approve a resolution to participate in the coordinated election on Nov. 7 in support of a 2024 BEST grant application and a voter approved bond.

“The community has expressed and shown their support for Haxtun Schools and the need for additional athletic facilities. Last fall, we realized that it would be wise to step back and evaluate our facilities as a whole,” Superintendent Marsha Cody said in later follow up regarding pursuit of a BEST grant. “Our needs are broad and include needing to update many of our aging facilities, moving the ag shop to the high school to prevent students from losing instructional time by walking through snow, ice and rain unsupervised each hour, increasing the size of our preschool rooms, replacing the carpeting/flooring throughout the district and updating our facilities to align with the electrical and technology needs required in this one to one device era are a few examples. Therefore in February the Board of Education decided to undergo a comprehensive facilities master planning process and contracted with Wold to do so.”

That process, she said, included a site walk through in mid-march with Wold Architects and Engineers including two mechanical engineers, an electrical engineer and two architects. That meeting was followed up by a meeting with the administration team and some of the Facility Planning Committee members.

The Board of Education invited the following community members to sit on the Facility Planning Committee: John Chapdelaine, Alicia Schram, Jessica Ayala, Mark Gueck, JD Stone, Mike Ensminger, Tim Hahn, Regan Biesemeier, Kilgour, Cody, Becky Heinz, Lindsey Goddard, Jeff Plumb, Paige Thompson and Starkebaum.

That committee met four times throughout the spring to discuss the District’s facility data, facility deficiencies, programming/facility needs, criteria to address deficiencies and possible solutions. In late April, a community meeting was held to discuss the committee’s findings and criteria for addressing needs. Approximately 60 community members attended. A second committee meeting was held in May with discussion focused on solutions to address the agreed upon criteria from the first community meeting.

“The solution reached through the community meetings and the Facility Planning Committee is to solve the deficiencies by building two additions to the current junior high and high schools,” Cody said. “One addition will replace the 1962 elementary school, which will include larger preschool rooms and a shared, centrally located cafeteria. The second addition would be a new ag shop and Career Technical Education wing connected to the high school to eliminate students commuting between the high school and the ag shop during each hour of the day. The ag shop was built in the 1950s. The proposal includes renovations to update the current high school, locker rooms, and moving junior high classrooms closer to the high school.”

More information on the BEST grant application and bond request will follow. For more information, contact Cody, any Board of Education member or any Facility Planning Community member listed above.

After agreeing to move forward with the BEST grant project, the local BOE voted to approve the 2023-24 budget as presented.

“There are not any major changes or purchases in the 2023-2024 budget that are different from the 2022-2023 FY budget. Additional funds have been allocated to continue to increase teacher salaries, develop a strong technology budget and for new junior/senior high math and English curriculum as well as high school biology curriculum,” Cody said.

In other business the Board:

• Approved Lauer, Szabo and Associates P.C. to perform the 2022-23 financial audit;

• Approved the resignation of Darwin Jeffers as a route bus driver;

• Approved Lisa Atkins as high school English teacher;

• Approved Tara Scott as the K-12 special education teacher with a 12-day extended contract and GT Coordinator;

• Approved Kimberly Jones as a second grade teacher;

• Approved Rob Martinez as a part-time weight room teacher;

• Approved Havilah Andersen as a part-time weight room teacher and part-time junior high janitor;

• Approved Nicole Kleve as an instructional para-professional;

• Approved the 2023-24 substitute list;

• Approved Taylor Schram, Kaiden Schelling and Alan Coffin as part-time summer employees;

• Approved Dustin Seger as an assistant junior high football coach;

• Approved Lynda Firme as a volunteer GT interventionist;

• Approved Matt Ramirez as a volunteer high school football coach;

• Approved to add eight additional days for high school FACS teacher Holly Kelley.