Board looks at safety protocols

Posted

The Huron School Board of Education held its regular meeting Monday evening. The board approved 12 new hires and one resignation. Grant funding was approved for $15,000 to purchase equipment for food service-School Nutrition.

Superintendent Terry Nebelsick thanked American Bank and Trust for the adult face masks donated to the district, and Clara Carter and the BCNU Extension Club for their generous donation of various school supplies and book bags.
Nebelsick thanked the task force, school nurses, and people working at test centers and making the calls, working with allowing the staff to be on the front line of keeping the schools open. Nebelsick explained that the commitment to staying open has become very complicated.

Nebelsick said as of Monday night he believes the kindergarten though fifth grade doesn’t have one student in close contact, while in the middle school and high school, some students have been identified as close contact  because of family illness.

“Our goal is to stay open, and to be safe, and all 400 employees are all critical infrastructure workers if designated by the Superintendent,” said Nebelsick, adding if staff members are designated, they have the choice to work or not during the quarantine.

“We have protocols in place that the board did a lot of work on this summer — to wash hands constantly, to wear masks at all times, to be behind shields whenever possible, to social distance in every situation that we can,” he said. “We have added a fifth armor, to make sure no group of students, even though they are masked and shielded, are within six feet of each other for no longer then 14 minutes, because in 15 minutes there is supposed to be a magnified amount of probability that the contaminant can get through a mask.”

Nebelsick said to the best of his understanding, there has not been a child or faculty member that has contracted COVID from being in school.

Linda Pietz spoke on behalf of Jolene Koneche, director of federal programs, on the good news report on title programs. Title 1A is offered to kindergarten through 8th grade, and provides financial assistance to high schools or districts with high numbers of low income families based on free and reduced lunch numbers. Title 1C provides funding to eligible entities to help migratory children overcome various barriers and obstacles so they can achieve high academic standards. Title 1D programs are for students in correctional facilities, such as JDC and Our Home, and students at risk of academic failure. The high school is not considered a title school.

In new business, state soccer requested use of the Tiger Stadium for the games on Oct. 17, with the understanding they need the Board’s approval if the district is still operating in yellow. The Board approved.

An emergency change to the substitute teacher scale for part time and substitute teachers was approved. Since the district is having a difficult time getting positions filled, this pay incentive is for Substitute teacher positions only. The pay would increase depending on how many days in a calendar month the teacher worked, with pay increases after working 5 days, over 10 days, and over 15 days. This pay incentive would reset every calendar month.

Business Manager Kelly Christopherson provided a construction update and is having another set back with the lockers the middle school. The ship date is now set for Oct. 21.

He talked about the new phone system that was put into the high school and middle school, and working with security systems on doors and locks. “Ive been busy with the new substitute teacher system called Smart Find Express, its a web based system.”

Christopherson said they will input all the teachers and substitutes, and when substitutes are needed, the computer will try to fill the jobs.

“There is a lot of data that has to be input and uploaded before we can get it off the ground,” he added.
Christopherson is hoping to have Smart Find Access accessible by Jan. 1, 2021