South Central School Superintendent Kerry Herdes says they will be able to address numerous issues and improve air quality with their first $839,000 in COVID relief money granted to the school.
Herdes told the school board Wednesday night the improvements include the replacement of many of the roof-top heating and air conditioning units at South Central High, Middle School, and Grade School.
“We’re going kinda knock down two birds with one stone. We’re looking at replacing somewhere in the neighborhood of 28 units and retrofitting them with new COVID-19 air purification systems. That will be a good thing for us.”
Herdes says the remaining 12 units are newer and will be retrofitted with the ionization air filters at a later date.
He says the district is setting aside $236,000 of the money to retain eight to ten teaching and aide positions.
“Additional staff, meaning the teachers and aides in place, to address kids with learning loss. To continue to do that and not be in a RIF type situation or lessening that group of people that we know we are relying on right now to get kids caught up.”
And Herdes says every classroom in the district will get the latest review board.
“The Viewsonic board is going to replace what he have right now, called the Bright Link. It basically is one flat panel board that is interactive. It hooks up to computers as well. It has some really nice features on it. It’s very tidy, one unit, and the graphics are unbelievable compared to what we have in place right now.”
Herdes says the new boards can also be used as a whiteboard and written on. The units cost $2,000 apiece. The total expense to provide one for each of the district’s 60 classrooms is $120,000.
The district will seek bids for the purchase of one or two new air-conditioned busses with a built-in air filtration system. The expected cost is around $80,000 per bus.
The long-needed replacement of the dust collection system in the shop at the high school will also be completed at a cost of around $5,000.
Herdes and the board agreed to keep next year’s graduation outside at the high school with further enhancements. He reports good reviews, especially with the high school and eighth-grade graduations being held together.
The board approved its amended budget for the fiscal year ending June 30th. Herdes says it is currently $200,000 in the red, but that could improve dramatically if they get one more expected $80,000 transportation check before the end of the month.
In personnel action, the board approved the resignations of elementary teacher Lauren Lotz and Middle School teacher Jacob Guy. The board hired Travis Mulvaney as Special Education Teacher and Julie Holmes as Middle School Head Cook.
