The Centralia grade school board approved the purchase of five portable weapon detectors at its regular meeting Tuesday night. The Opengate weapon detectors were purchased for $100,000 using funding from the ISBE Stronger Connections Grant. Superintendent Craig Clark says the district has wanted these detectors for some time and credits assistant superintendent Chris Becker with writing the grant and making the purchase possible.
“We actually started working on this grant for these weapon detectors prior to a lot of the threats that the schools have been facing in the area,” Clark said. “I’m grateful to Mrs. Becker for writing the grant… we hope to place them mainly at the junior high. They are mobile, so we’ll be able to use them for events at the other schools as well. If they have a Christmas program or any evening activities we can move them from school to school, but on a daily basis these five will be set up at the junior high.”
Under the same grant, the board also approved the purchase of a Fortigate 200F firewall for $21,000. Clark said the firewall was added on to the grant application for the weapon detectors and approved. The firewall will be an additional layer of digital protection to secure student data in the school district.
The board had planned to receive the annual audit report from Glass and Shuffett at Tuesday night’s meeting, but the auditors postponed. An extension will be filed, and the audit report will be presented at the November school board meeting.
In personnel, the board hired Jace Hughes as seventh grade boys’ basketball coach. The board accepted the resignations of April Snow as homebound teacher, Allison Austin as individual paraprofessional at Schiller School, and Evalynne Snyder as individual paraprofessional at Jordan School. The board accepted intent to retire letters from Central Middle School cook Bev Braun effective at the end of the school year, and from bus monitor Donna Wooters effective December 2024.
