Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
The Colfax School board met Monday night with a modified agenda due to snow, postponing a Jennings Elementary board appreciation event at the school library.
Board members instead gathered in their regular meeting room and Superintendent Jerry Pugh opened by thanking city and county snow-plow crews.
“Even the gravel roads got it today,” he said, as snow continued to fall outside the window, after a two-hour school delay earlier. “You won’t be able to tell in the morning.”
Pugh noted that Mark Brown, the district’s maintenance director, was in by 3:30 a.m Monday. Pugh specifically thanked Todd Imeson, bus driver, and Mike Koenig, groundskeeper and bus driver, who chained up buses and answered calls at the bus garage.
The board approved the hiring of Dean Hall, bus driver, and the resignation of Hannah Walker, para-educator.
Approvals followed for a $110,533 bid for a new IC Bus from Harlow’s Bus Sales of Spokane Valley, and an overnight trip request for the National Honor Society to go to Silver Mountain March 8-9 for a ski trip.
The board also signed off on a request to allow eighth-graders to play varsity baseball and softball for the high school this spring, as the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association now allows it, with league approval, if a school does not have a junior high feeder program in that sport.
The board also approved a co-operative agreement with Pullman High School for a Colfax student to play tennis with their girls’ team.
TRIP TO OLYMPIA
Pugh then reported on a two-day trip he took to Olympia, along with Oakesdale Superintendent Jake Dingman and Tekoa’s Mark Heid. They met with area legislators Mark Schoessler, Joe Schmick and Mary Dye, also going to the governor’s budget office, to discuss new benefit requirements for school districts regarding part-time and full-time staff. The new rules, which came out of the 2018 legislative session to start for the 2019-20 school year would require districts to pay full-time benefits for part-time workers, among other changes.
“We’re asking to delay it a year, to get our feet grounded on this. We really haven’t figured out McCleary yet,” Pugh said, referring to new rules on how much schools may ask for in regular levies, as part of the state’s mandate to fully fund education.
Pugh noted one option being proposed is to help pay for the benefits change.
“To raise property taxes to pay for state-mandated insurance? I didn’t think our voters would go for that,” Pugh said.
The three superintendents also met with Washington’s Professional Educator’s Standards board, to discuss new requirements for para-educators.
FURTHER ITEMS
In other comments at Monday’s meeting, board member Brian Becker noted he attended the senior presentation night.
“I still think that is one of the most valuable things that students do,” he said, adding it can confirm a child’s interest in a career field and also check it off as something they do not want to do.
Board president Jennifer Hauser thanked Pugh and Shawn Stine, district office secretary, for a call at 9:30 p.m. the night before, informing of the two-hour delay Monday.
“There will be another one after the meeting tonight,” Pugh said with a smile.
The automatic calls, recorded by Stine, go out the night before a delay – if known the previous evening.
Pugh, as he often does during snow events, drove the roads for an hour-and-a-half Sunday afternoon to gauge the situation.
CONCLUSION
Next on the agenda Monday, for the ASB report, student representative Kylie Kackman took the board through updates including FBLA’s appearance at winter regionals, after which three Colfax students are state bound. The FCCLA finished its popcorn fundraiser and, in FFA job interview, Gunnar Aune advanced to state. Wrestling senior night was Jan. 26, after which Colfax took first in districts at Pomeroy and will head to state in Tacoma this weekend.
The board meeting concluded with a discussion of chapter two of “Wait, What? And Life’s Other Essential Questions” by James E. Ryan (HarperCollins, 2017). Ryan is the Dean of Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. The board is all reading the book at once.
They will meet again Feb. 25 for an abbreviated agenda as Pugh will be absent. A special meeting is scheduled for March 6 to consider bids for the upcoming school remodeling/construction, to be paid for by the $18.9 million bond passed last February.
Garth Meyer is a former Whitman County Gazette reporter.
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