New security measures set in place for visitors at PEM

By Josh Hall, Staff Reporter
Cont. from Thursday, March 5...
There was no correspondence or public comment, so they led right into the Principal’s report, beginning with Mr. Donze, PreK-3 principal. March is an exciting month. Mr. Donze talked about the 5-2-1-0 Program from the Wabasha Health System, led by Julie Jacobs, that has been coming every month. He wishes to thank them publicly, as it has been a great campaign and every kid in the school knows about it. On Friday, March 6th, was STEM day for 2nd, 3rd & 4th grade. March 19th is Agriculture Day followed by Explore the Arts day on March 20th from 8-noon, with many, mostly local, artisans and is taking place in the MultiPurpose Room, coordinated by Molly McDonald. On Monday, March 16, During the Monday Morning Meeting they will be celebrating all of the Math Mania volunteers as a recognition. Kindergarten Welcome was on the week of the 9th. Instead of them taking the day off, the soon-to-be kindergartners will be joining in with the kindergartners, giving them a hands-on look of what they actually do in Kindergarten.
Next, Mr. Olstad, 4-8 principal, talked about the annual IBM E-week coming up with volunteers from IBM coming to help 6th & 7th grade against Holly Rademacher, Braida McKenzie and Steve Baumgartener. He also made a comment about the integration achievement that is at the end of their budget, Mr. Olstad is also on that committee, and the process will be that this 3 year event will be 6th-8th graders collaborating with Rochester’s diversity. There are seven schools involved, including PEM, Dover-Eyota, Zumbrota-Mazeppa, Byron, Stewartville, Pine Island and Chatfield. All seven of these schools get the budget money, but they must collaborate with Rochester. They meet approximately 8-9 times a year. This year they started small, with a presentation and live webcast, where PEM used one of the 8th grade science labs, with all 8 schools. Each district had a school representative for 6, 7 & 8th ask questions to the presenter, live questions back and forth with students. Their next big project in the summer of 2016, all schools will meet at Rochester, looking at the Mayo Clinic with a focal point to have some major summer integration with a variety of the middle school-aged students, paying for transportation, food, a couple 2 or 3 day events, but getting the Mayo Clinic involved in showing the kids. But a big part of getting this budget money is for integration – the diversity of Rochester with surrounding schools - to integrate the area with Rochester.
Mr. Ihrke, Senior High principal, spoke briefly about the girl’s basketball playing their subsection tournament at the Mayo Civic Center, the large group band and choir music contest in Byron last Tuesday. He also noted that the Knowledge Bowl has had 1 team qualify for the section championships. He stated that they are past the 6-week mark of the 3rd quarter, and at the end of the quarter (3rd week in March), they have a work day on Monday, March 23rd and the following Thursday are Parent-Teacher conferences for 2nd semester from 4pm-8pm as open conferences. Mr. Ihrke made a comment about the future of parent-teacher conferences look like, and making changes in the future. With Schoology, email, etc., one thing they are thinking about, looking at Lake City, is going to student-led advisor conferences. In this, the student would put together a portfolio and present it to their parents with their advisor and if there were questions with a certain class, the parent would connect with that teacher. This is something they are looking into for the future, as conferences have changed a lot from the way they were just 3-4 years ago
Mr. Ihrke informed the board that they have statewide ACT testing on April 28, which is the first time that all of the Juniors in Minnesota will be testing. Some of the local schools are not having school for the high school on those days, but PEM will be. He also stated that there are rules, such as the desks have to be a certain distance from each other and things like that, and go without bells. They are wrestling a bit with how that day is going to look in the high school. They also, by choice, will be doing their NWEA testing on that same day with their 9th and 10th graders. They may possibly do a half-day of school with the seniors and community service in the morning. A question arose from a board member whether the “ACT testing will be run like normal where the students must register through the ACT website, and can the results be used? Normally a student would register and then tell them where they want those scores sent. How does that work?” Mr. Ihrke’s reply was, “it is a hybrid of that. Mrs. Shindelar is sending out information to parents. The registration is different than normal. Normally, students would go online and register on the ACT site, but for this one, we will be registering our students here, universally across the state. Nonetheless, it does count as a legitimate ACT score. Each student will be able to send the results to 4 schools free. There is no fee involved, the state of Minnesota is picking this one up. There are ACT-allowable accommodations, such as the 1:1 (students having the test read to them), but if the student takes the state accommodations, it doesn’t count as a national ACT test. But for 98% of the students, it will count as a legitimate ACT test that they can submit up to 4 schools at no cost to them.” He mentioned that April also has a lot of MCA testing, making for a lot of testing all in one month.
Next, Haley Gudmundson spoke as a representative for student body, stated that there was not much going on, but mentioned that Snow Week went well and that their queen was Emily Haley and Andy Bonatti. All the games and the pep fest went well and was a fun time. Student Council as a whole, are trying to figure out their debates and elections for the sophomores and freshmen that want to be on the student council. They are looking at that being sometime in April. She also mentioned that there were a couple of high school students who were going to the STEM day that Friday. The same group that did the 4th grade would be going to the elementary. It was also stated that the Snow Week dance went very well. Haley said that they tried a concession stand this time, and she believes they sold more water than anything, even though there was a water fountain right there.
Andy Bernard of the technology department talked about a conference with technology directors he attended in Wisconsin, where the main focus was trying to figure out some digital signage vendors. He believes he found some, looking at putting some screens in the different buildings for getting announcements out, similar to what some hotels have, where you walk into the lobby and they have a screen with different information on it. There was one screen in the high school that burnt out about a week prior. It was about 3 years old, but running 24/7 every day, they do burn out faster. They finished up their clarity survey with the staff and students, but are still doing a bit to get the 3rd grade to answer some of the surveys to get all their data back, and at the April meeting he should be able to share information with the board. Next he discussed the filter on the iPad, filtering content that the students can access on their iPad. When the iPad is in the building, it runs on a filter called Lightspeed, but outside of the school there isn’t a filter that works. The filter was blocking far too much stuff, such as college websites and such. On one hand it was a good thing, because it was blocking the websites they shouldn’t be using at home, but there were a lot of college websites and things that they couldn’t get into. They have now been able to run a Proxy portal, so now if a student is at home and looking up a website, the traffic will come back to the school, go through the school filter and then out to the world. It was tested with some senior’s for a couple of weeks and implemented it on Monday, March 2nd. There were several students who said that they couldn’t get into Netflix at home, so that will be looked into. Anything that was blocked at the school was also being blocked at home. This summer, the school site will be moved to a GMC site, where they will host it and nothing will be stored on campus anymore, making it more secure. The school will also have a new website address. There is a forwarding aspect in the old address that will take you to the new one, so the old one still works.
Next up was the Monthly Budget report. The bottom line of the revenue is sitting at 66%, but skewing that number this month is the bond refunding. This particular bond is not a crossover, but rather a refunding of $1.5 million, and it will be turned around and paid off in March. It is in the account, but will not be there for long. Next months figures will be closer to the normal percentages. There is a 75% under “Other People Support”, under program 790, which is because of fees paid going along with the bond refunding. On the treasurer’s report, food service is showing a -$10,000. Talking to Tami Folkert of food service, the main thing causing that is the a la carte sales. They are down approximately $50,000 from where they were this time last year. This is basically because of the regulations and the kinds of foods they can actually serve on the a la carte line.
During his superintendent report, Mr. Kuphal expressed some safety concerns stemming from a “non-threatening” incident that happened about a month ago at the school, causing them to think about their security. They are making a couple of changes district wide. One of those changes is making new visitor badges, as well as bright yellow lanyards. All visitors, including board members will be asked to wear one of them upon entering school. Another change is regarding the nurse’s office. As it is closest to the district office, when a student gets sick, instead of the relative signing in and going to the nurse’s station, the secretary will call down to the nurses station and the child will be brought to them. They are taking a look at reducing the traffic in the buildings. Mr. Kuphal understands that it is much easier for some buildings than others, such as the 4-6 building where visitors do not need to sign in. This will be an adjustment for everyone. They are going to send out a school messenger notice alerting the public of this change. All visitors are asked to come to the office upon entering the school. If a staff member sees someone without a badge or lanyard, they will be escorted to the office. They also have a bright green lanyard for all substitutes that are at the school during the day. Also, if students see someone who is not on staff and not wearing one of the two lanyards, they would like them to report it to a staff member and would like a staff member to check out the situation and escort them to the office. It was questioned by a board member as to whether staff would/should be required to wear a lanyard, but Mr. Kuphal states that staff knows staff…students know staff. It has not been ruled out as a possibility, but at this point they do not feel it is necessary. There was also concern about a situation where someone shows up at a classroom not wearing a lanyard and then a teacher escorts them to the office, leaving the classroom unattended, to which Mr. Kuphal emphasized that this is a work in progress, and it might be that the teacher call down to the office and have someone come to the classroom to escort them to the office to receive their badge. Next, Mr. Kuphal then spoke about the girl’s basketball situation of the possibility of them going to state. Policy states that for sporting events where the team would go to state, the school may let out early, but not before noon. But, he stated that if the girls did go to state, playing at the Target Center, they would be playing at 2:00pm. As it is a 2 hour drive there, and many family members in school (siblings, etc.) would like to go with their parents, that would not be very feasible to get there on time. He then asked the board how they would feel about letting school out at 11:00am, although the policy states that it cannot let out before noon. He was not asking for a motion or a decision, he just wanted to ask the board if they would support that decision.
They then went on to discus committee reports, beginning with Transportation and Facilities. “We have busses and we have buildings.” Their discussion was mostly the overall package of what they’re doing in terms of possibly hiring someone to come in and look at all the facilities and all the means that they have. They also talked about prioritizing many of the issues that are brought up to the facilities committee. They also tried to figure out exactly which phase they are in with the new fields. The track is ready to run on, but working on where they are with the sound systems, lights, etc. They also discussed the situation with Ekstein field. The city wants to come in and make improvements, and have asked whether or not the school would be willing to help with a few of the upgrades.
Next up was MREA. They were in the cities on Monday and Tuesday for a board of directors meeting, where they met with a number of legislators, which was disappointing because a number of GOP legislators were invited but none showed up. The MREA has a great number of priorities, but the $1.87 billion changes everything, in terms of going in and negotiating with the House, the Senate and the Governor, they’re looking at trying to get the equalization for facilities and debt service reduction. It’s frustrating, the fact that most of the legislators are from the metro area, so coming from outside of that area, it’s somewhat a challenge. But, all in all, it was very productive and connections were made and hopefully made an impact.
Staff Development met and their main focus is SEMLAC (Southeast Minnesota Learner Achievement Collaborative). PEM has been in this for 3 years with 5 other schools and the question has come up: “Is it time to make a change?” They also attended a SEMLAC Committee meeting in Rochester and the came to the conclusion that they do not need to disband, but they do need to change what they are doing.
HVED, Southeast Service Coop, Finance Committee, Wellness, Community Ed, Meet and Confer and Policy Committee did not meet before the School Board Meeting.
After the reports, they moved on to the consent agenda. The first item is regarding personnel:
1. Mike Jeppson, 4th Grade Teacher - Retirement
2. Mike Jeppson, JrHi Football Coach - Resignation
3. Kim Ihrke, Assistant Track & Field Coach - Leave of Absence for Spring
4. Bill Theisen, BTeam Basketball Coach - Resignation
5. Kurt Boyum, Elementary PhyEd Teacher - Retirement
6. Johanna Schmitz, JrHi Science Teacher Long Term Sub - Hire (sub for maternity leave)
7. Colby Alberts, K3 Phy Ed Teacher Long Term Sub Hire
8. Amanda McFadden, High School Counselor & District Assessment Coordinator - Resignation
9. Amanda McFadden, Prom Advisor - Resignation
10. Amanda McFadden, National Honor Society Advisor - Resignation
11. Robin Holst, 3rd Grade Teacher - Retirement
12. Mike Heppner, JrHi Golf Coach - Hire
All were approved unanimously by the School Board.
Next they discussed the hire of a PK-3 Special Education Child-Specific Paraprofessional. Mr. Donze had stated that right now they have a 3rd grade student who requires an all-day paraprofessional with him, and he feels that if there is another student who would require a child-specific paraprofessional, that only having one, would not be sufficient, because the only time that their schedule would line up would be at lunch, where the student would still need someone with them. Mr. Donze is requesting permission from the board to hire another Child-Specific Paraprofessional, which was motioned and approved unanimously. Mr. Kuphal mentioned that when they advertised for the first one, they had 22 applicants, which provides a good pool of applicants to choose from.
There were no donations, so they went on to the 2nd reading of the 2016-17 School Calendar, which there were no changes needed, so it was motioned to approve the calendar. It was approved.
Next up was the facility analysis, where a copy of the proposal of construction consultant partners, specifically Randy Lutz, where they had discussed transportation facilities. There were four parts to his proposal. They decided to take them a step at a time, slowly do the first part of the analysis and see what they get, and decide whether they want to go on with him or not. What he would be doing is coming and giving a picture of what they have, pointing out not the obvious, but a thorough report of everything they have. The first phase would cost a total of $10,450, which is based upon the amount of time that he believes he would have to spend there. This would be done in conjunction with the Transportation & Facilities Committee. This was approved unanimously.
The Integration and Achievement Budget was discussed, and the maximum revenue for next year would be $52,582.78 and needed to be submitted to the Department of Education by March 15th. This was also approved.
Lastly, there was discussion about a property that a homeowner contacted Mr. Kuphal about possibly purchasing, whose lot line butts up against the schools property. After talking to the legal department, it was said that the board had to come up with a price to give to Mr. Kuphal of what they would like to send. They were given the option of going into a closed session, which was accepted.
After coming back from the closed session, they had board member comments. The only one brought up was how out-of-date the school website is. There is much that is 2-3+ years old, which is not impressive. There was also a reminder of the work session on March 24th, accepted at the last board meeting. The auditorium committee was also invited, and possibly inviting the Transportation and Facilities committee.
The meeting was adjourned at 8:30pm.