R-5 board OKs new communication system for parents

By Steve Moyer

Nevada Daily Mail

Board members voted to approve a new tool to improve communications with parents and students. Superintendent Craig Noah said the program, which he only recently heard about, was a service that would cost the school approximately $6,500 a year but would be free to the students and their parents, during a regular meeting at the high school on Wednesday.

"This is a new program that came to my attention within the last month to month and a half," Noah said. "This is something that parents can sign up for free of charge, to them, that allows the district to communicate with them using the telephone numbers they provide to us."

Noah said the service was capable of handling many different groups of students but would first be used in a more limited manner.

"For instance you can have a subgroup composed of middle school band students," Noah said. "If they are away somewhere the sponsor can call from there and enter the code and the message could go out to all the parents when to come pick up their children."

Board member Jan Benbrook said something similar had been tried before but wasn't successful.

"There was a program several years ago but after awhile it wasn't used," Benbrook said. "Would this end up the same way?"

Noah said the program had some basic features that would be worth the investment and that other services could be added later.

"I look at that as something we can grow into," Noah said. "I see this as being used more for weather cancellations and safety issues where we might be in a lockdown for now. We can add other options later."

Noah added that this would be something that could be terminated if it didn't prove useful.

"This is for a one-year contract," Noah said. "I wouldn't want to commit to anything long-term at this point. This gives us an evaluation period to see if this is something we want to offer the students and their parents."

The board voted to approve the program for one year as presented.

The board looked over the bids for insurance for the bus fleet, workmen's compensation, boilers and total property liability and chose the lowest bidders in each category. State Farm Insurance won the bid for the bus fleet for $30,050, CPSK from Harrisonville won the total property and the workmen's compensation bids at $169,355 and $94,382 respectively and Morrison Post Insurance won the bid for the boiler insurance at $1,404.86.

Board member Larry Forkner questioned why the boilers have their own insurance and weren't covered under the total property liability insurance. Assistant Superintendent Christi Peterson replied that boilers are in a separate category because they had unique characteristics that put them on a different actuarial table.

High School principal Bryan Thomsen updated the board on the Professional Learning Communities program. The program brings teachers together with each other and students who may be struggling to work on helping them succeed. He pointed out the staff has developed a new strategy for rewarding good performance, as well as intervening in bad performance.

"Most PLCs use a pyramid of interventions," Thomsen said. "Our staff felt that left rewards off. Instead of a pyramid of intervention, they came up with a diamond of excellence."

Thomsen explained that as a student improved not only do the interventions go down, but the rewards go up.

Thomsen said that one of the improvements he hoped comes from the PLC is the reduction of the failure rate of freshmen entering the high school.

"Right now 19 percent of freshmen fail one class," Thomsen said. "We want to cut that in half, to 10 percent. This is the first year for the program at the middle school and we hope that will help having the students coming in already benefiting from early help."

Donna Wagner updated the board on the Career Ladder program, which provides funding for bonuses for teachers who provide extra services to the districts students and parents.

"We appreciate the board finding the money each year for this program," Wagner said. "We realize it is a privilege we enjoy, not a right."

In other business the board:

* Set the tax rate hearing for Wednesday, Aug. 8 at 7 p.m., the regular meeting time.

* Approved the Special Educational Annual Assurances, which pledges the district to comply with federal guidelines.

* Prepared for the Missouri School Boards Association conference, in conjunction with the Missouri Association of School Administrators, Oct. 25-28.