January 8, 2018 at 4:00 PM - Board of Education Regular Meeting

This agenda contains a list of subjects known at the time of its distribution.  A copy of the agenda reflecting any changes will be available for public inspection during normal business hours in the District Office.  Except for items of an emergency nature, the agenda shall not be altered later than twenty-four hours before the meeting.  The Board reserves the right to alter the order of items, as it deems necessary.

Information concerning the Open Meeting Law, Chapter 84, Article 14 of Nebraska State Statutes, is posted on the bulletin board in the back of the meeting room.

We have two options for the election of officers process according to Policy 2002:

Option #1:
A board member has the option of making a motion to suspend the rules and retain current officers.  Once this motion is made, a second would be needed and then discussion and voting could take place.  If a second is not received, the motion would die for lack of a second or supporting motion.

Option #2:
Election positions:

1.  A nomination ballot listing all board members will be distributed.
2.  Each board member will nominate two members for president.  The two members receiving the most votes are nominated.  In the event of a tie among three or more members, the members who tied advance to a second nomination ballot.  Again, each member votes for two with the two members receiving the most votes being the nominees for the office.
3.  The two nominees are placed on a ballot for election to the office.  In the event of a tie, a second vote will be taken.  In the event of a second tie, the winner will be selected by a toss of a coin.
4. The same procedure will be followed for nominating and electing the vice president, however, the member elected president will not be on the ballot.
5. The remaining four board members will be nominees for treasurer.  A vote will be taken as in #3 above, but using the remaining four members as the nominees.
6. The remaining three board members will be nominees for secretary.  The same voting process as in #3 above, but using the remaining three members as the nominees.

Committees:

The Board president appoints committee members.  The attached committee list has Jessica on the committees that Larry was on.

This is the public’s opportunity to speak to items on the agenda. This is also the public’s opportunity to speak to any topic concerning the school district – since it is not an agenda item the board cannot discuss or take action on the matter at this time. Future discussion can be requested as an agenda item. To be recognized, all participants must complete the Request to Address the Milford Board of Education Form. No complaints regarding specific staff members will be heard during a public meeting. The District has established separate procedures for complaints against individual employees. Thank you for your participation.

General Fund for $106,086.74   We added $4,521.59 today.  Updated Number is - $110,608.33
Payroll for $560,237.61
Total $666,324.35    Updated Total is - $670,845.94

Items to Point Out:

1. Once again, majority of the items are yearly items or maintenance items.
2. The two expenditures to Apple ($11,283) and the expenditure to CDW ($12,268) are for technology for our special education department.  This will be reimbursed at the end of the year through Federal IDEA funds.
3. Bus repairs - some of these items are related to items found in our 80 day inspections.  Might be a few more of these next month.
4. $5,867 to ESU 5 is for hosting our Powerschool system (student information system).  We were hosting this through ESU 6 but had to move it to ESU 5 who hosts the consortium.  $4,000 of this is a one time fee for hosting on their servers.  We no longer purchase our own servers to host this system.
5. $7,924 to OnToCollege is our fee for John Baylor ACT test prep.  This is our yearly fee for on site training, books/workbooks, and our online subscription that all students can use.

Please email if you have questions.

Legislative Bills - here are a few carryover bills to watch closely.

PK is at 38

K-6 - 406

7-8 - 111

9-12 - 213

K-12 - 730

PK-12 - 768

Total number is 2 students higher than last month and 18 students higher than May 2017.  The K-6 is 31 students larger than in May 2017.

The latest report from NDE is attached.  It shows there are 27 Exempt Schools in our District boundaries with an enrollment of 75 students.

I have nothing to share at this point.  I will be watching proceedings at the Legislature and will send updates when I have them available.

These are policies that we review each January.  If a change is recommended, we will add it to the February agenda.

This is a yearly requirement.

This is a yearly item.  We appoint Tammy as the day-to-day treasurer.

We have requests from Joanie Vann and Ethan Price.  I have attached our policy and the two requests.  We recommend approval of the requests.

I will add the actual document when Bobby and the city's lawyer finish updates.  The city council meeting scheduled for January 4th did not take place due to a lack of a quorum so I may not have any documents to review until Monday.

I feel we need to have a retreat session to talk about staffing, goals and priorities for the future.  I am recommending that we look at Monday, January 22nd or another date in that time period that works for all of us.  So please bring your calendars.  I would like the meeting to start as early as possible and will provide a meal for us. 

We received an option enrollment request for Karlena Hardaway.  Karlena is in 8th grade.  You will see on the attached guidelines we have set for option enrollment, the current 8th grade is at 65 students and our limit is set at 60 students.  Based on our policy we would normally deny this request.  Obviously, the board can waive the policy and accept Karlena. 

These are hard situations to be in.  I want Karlena to be successful wherever she attends school but we also need to look at what is best for MPS.  The administrative recommendation would be to follow policy and deny the request based on numbers.  Our issue is that we could receive requests this spring, or over the summer, and have to accept them based on this decision, or have a student move into the district that would increase the size of this class.

The Board of Education reserves the right to enter into Closed/Executive Session for 1) the protection of the public interest, or 2) the prevention of needless injury to the reputation of an individual, and/or the individual has not requested a public meeting. When making a motion to enter into Closed/Executive Session, the member making the motion should be as specific as possible as to the reason(s) for executive session.

The Board President will restate the reason for Closed/Executive Session after the motion has been acted on.