School Board Meeting 01-08-06, part 2

Thanks to Brad Moulton for sending his notes from last night's school board meeting:

Meeting started at 7:58 after what Mr. Keller described as a ‘long executive meeting’ beforehand. The only comment during the first Brief Community Corner was from Mr. Iaccone about the Morning Call article (‘Can No Child law pass biggest test?’ – Jan 8, 2007). He pointed out some of the highlights from the meeting.

Ms. Dautrich handed out copies of the AYP report cards. They were broken down by district and school. They are available on-line (www.paayp.com). No big surprises (we’ve seen the scores).

A presentation was made on RtI (Response to Intervention) by Ro Mentesana, Tracy Ruschman and Stacy Kulics. The district is moving towards RtI to assess students (particulary in K-2) of math and reading deficiencies and whether they need additional services or even special education. The difficulty with RtI is the extra time required for the different classification (Tiers) of students. The state recommends that Tier II and Tier III classified students receive 30-60 minutes extra instructional time in math/reading. Dr. Lesky stated that this would require NASD to look at our school day (length?).

The Finance report was presented. NASD was audited recently and the auditor found one (1) finding. It had to do with funding for non-reimbursable busing for charter school students.

Candidates interested in running for school board need to file by March 6. Sometime (it wasn’t entirely clear) before the week of Feb 13, petitions required for filing would be available through the Northampton County Commission of Elections. Interested candidates can contact the office at (610) 559-3055.

The Audit and Finance report was given by Mr. Maher. (Most of what was said here was previously reported in the Morning Call this morning). However, I’ll hit on some of the salient points:

• The committee has a problem with using General Fund Balance for meeting budget. They do not consider it ‘sustainable’.
• There are previous legal claims that need to be accounted for before we start taking money away (including a necessary 4 mos. Medical claims fund reserve which has a current deficit of $830K)
• The committee would like to see retaining $5M of borrowing capacity for any unanticipated expenditures. Current, projections have us within $1M of our borrowing capacity after 08-09.
• NASD likely faces a referendum after next years to meet projected budget.

Dr. Lesky said that cuts will be prioritized, possibly continuing the hiring freeze, however that would undoubtedly impact classes sizes for next year.

There was a presentation by D’Huy Engineering about the M/C reorganization. A good bit here, but apparently NASD costs for M/C were inline with the PASBO comparison.

During final community corner, a resident of Bushkill Township wanted to thank the board for implementing the Parent Portal.

Mr. Maher had a final comment near the end of the meeting that he was worried that a possible ‘Sunshine Law’ violation occurred because apparently the pool was discussed. Mr. Keller mentioned that 8 out of 9 board members did not ‘see it that way’.

Thanks again to Brad for forwarding his notes and sorry I couldn't get this up earlier.