August 23, 2012 – Lovely County Citizen – Page
School Board Continued from page 6
is “a lot of money and the loss of 75 students at somewhere near $6,000 apiece is another big ticket item of losses to the district.” Brown said he was concerned the assistant superintendent position and that of the high school principal were advertised but were never discussed or approved in an open board meeting. He also said that in his experience as a school superintendent, Title I funds cannot be used to pay the salary of a general education administrator. “I think you have three good principals here and a great superintendent, and I think that any of the duties that were scheduled for that person could be done by these four people, including grant money. So I would hope that if you go forward with anything like this, it will be brought up in open session and allow people given a chance to weigh in on it.” Dolce said he had the same concerns
and noted that if all three school districts were consolidated into one, with one superintendent, it might make sense to have an administrative team to oversee operations, and funds would be available to delegate administrative duties in a good manner. “As it stands, it’s just not feasible with the finances of this district to add on administrators. I think the expenditures should be on the teachers.” Board president Charles Templeton, after calling for a motion and approval to do so, answered a question from this reporter about whether a public school board member can also serve as a board member of a private school without it being a conflict of interest. He said it was checked into with Arkansas School Board Association attorney Kristen Gould. “She said there is no statutory conflict of interest,” Templeton reported. In other business, the board: • Welcomed new board member Peggy Kjelgaard, appointed to replace Tom Winters for his remaining one-year
term. Kjelgaard said she is “thrilled and honored” to be here. “When I saw the new high school, I said, ‘Oh my gosh, that’s in my town. I have to be a part of it.’” • Approved four student transfers, two in and two out, under the school choice regulations. • Approved the new substitute teacher list. • Approved last year’s actual and the upcoming year’s budgeted athletic expenditures. District treasurer Pam McGarrah said the state is using a new formula to calculate allocated costs for this item, so although it appears costs have increased substantially, they have not. • Approved, at Turner’s request, who forgot to put them on the agenda, two payments on the new high school: one for $458,292.80 to Kinco Constructors and $6,176 to Morrison Architecture. • Returned from executive session and voted to hire Tracy Ledesma as the high school/middle school Library Media staff person and Tiffany Sloan as a middle school special education aide.
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