R-5 schools receive no bids for high school elevator

By Steve Moyer

Nevada Daily Mail

No bids were received for the proposed elevator project at the high school and the project will be re-bid starting Oct. 19. Superintendent Craig Noah told the Nevada R-5 board the architect for the project will contact contractors who are known to work such projects to request bids.

Noah updated the board on capital projects in which the district is engaged. Two classrooms at Benton Elementary will be built by Nevada Regional Technical Center students on a concrete pad installed by a local contractor. The classrooms will be of wood construction with a brick veneer and will be approximately the same size as other classrooms at the school. Noah said the completion date depends on the weather but it is expected the project will be complete in late spring 2007.

The fence at the tennis court will be painted with an electrostatic process that will reduce overspray and should extend the life of the fence. An electric charge is applied to the fence which attracts the paint to it to help evenly coat the surface.

Christi Peterson presented the board with the results of the Missouri Assessment Program tests, which have changed from previous years. In previous years, the test was given to selected grades from elementary to high school. This year, all elementary grades plus selected high school students were tested.

Once again Nevada students performed well with the test, especially in mathematics where every grade, except grade 10, performed in the high achievement range, and all classes still did better than the Missouri average.

School bus safety week is set for Oct. 15-21. Noah told the board the district believes school bus safety is important, year-round.

"We take a tremendous amount of pride in our approach to bus safety," Noah said. "Every week is school bus safety week. This is just the one we celebrate."

The board approved keeping the tuition rate for out-of-state students at Heartland Behavior Health Services at $11,000 per year. Currently the program has more than 15 out-of-state students.

Board member Larry Forkner asked about in-state-students from districts other than Nevada.

"What about in-state-students," Forkner asked. "Is it hard to get reimbursed from their home districts?"

Barbara Gordon said it isn't a problem. "We send a letter of intent to bill and it's taken care of," Gordon said. "It's a minor process."

The board approved moving the location of the November board meeting to the Nevada Regional Technical Center.

"It's important to spend time in all of our facilities and stay familiar with the various programs that we offer our students," Noah said.

The board considered nominating one of its members to the Vernon County Enhanced Enterprise Zone Board and left it up to the two members who were in the zone to decide if they wished to be nominated and tabled the nomination until they had decided.

"This board is not for zoning properties, it is strictly for economic development," Noah said.

Dr. Warren Lovinger suggested the board leave it to the members to decide if they wish to participate or not before nominating anyone.

"What if we have a consensus that if they feel comfortable with being on the board that they let us know?" Lovinger said.