In her report to the School District 166 board on Thursday, February 19, Superintendent Beth Schwarz said she attended a recent public meeting at the Birch Grove Community School in Tofte. She congratulated Birch Grove for being named an “Interim High Quality School.” Schwarz said that Birch Grove had discussion on its budget challenges and she shared information on how the charter schools in Cook County impact ISD166’s special education budget.
Schwarz said all of the schools in Cook County— Birch Grove Community School, Great Expectations School and Oshki Ogimaag are all public schools. However, she said ISD 166 is considered the “resident” district and because of that “more responsibilities are placed on our shoulders.”
One of those responsibilities relates to special education. Schwarz said, “Regardless of where a student receives special ed services, the unreimburseable costs fall back to our district.”
Schwarz explained that the state covers about 69 percent of the cost of special education. Expenses over and above that are considered unreimbursables. Charter schools are responsible for 10 percent of the unreimburseables and the resident school district is responsible for 90 percent of those costs.
Schwarz said the problem with “that model” is that students needing additional help are spread out at the four different Cook County schools. She said costs would be much lower if all special education students were under one roof. She said if they were, one paraprofessional could potentially care for all four students, depending on the level of need.
Schwarz said she supports school choice, but noted that it made special education budget planning difficult for ISD 166.
Schwarz said in the 2013-14 school year, ISD166 paid $12,000 to Birch Grove Community School; and “quite a bit of money” to GES and Oshki Ogimaag for special education services.
In the 2014-2015 budget, ISD166 has $115,000 earmarked for special education at Great Expectations School; $39,400 for Oshki Ogimaag; and $8,532 for Birch Grove.
However, Schwarz said, that could “change on a dime.” She said if a special needs student leaves one of the charter schools, the expense would be lower. If a high needs special ed. student starts attending, costs could increase dramatically.
“It’s really hard to predict, year-to-year-to year,” said Schwarz.
Board Member Deb White asked, “And we have absolutely no control over that?”
Schwarz said no, it is state law. She added, “It is a significant, significant issue for our budget.”
Truancy and discipline policies explained
Principal Adam Nelson gave the school board more information on the ISD166 truancy policy, as requested in January. An unexcused absence is when a student does not report for class and a parent has not provided an excuse. If a student is more than five minutes late to a class, that is also considered an unexcused absence.
Nelson stressed that students can be truant while in school. “I think that is important for parents to understand,” he said explaining that is why the school sends out daily notices. He said the school asks parents to remind children to tell their advisory teacher if they are at band practice, or some other authorized activity.
Nelson said after too many unexcused absences, a diversion meeting is held and an agreement is made with the student. If a student continues to be truant, missing one or more class periods for three or more days, the matter goes to the court through a child protective services (CHIPS) truancy petition.
Fortunately, said Nelson, the school has had very few of those situations. He said 39 truancy warning letters had been sent out for the high school and 19 for the middle school. In the high school truancy diversion meetings had been held 21 times and in the middle school, 10 times. CHIPS truancy hearings had been held only five times in the high school and once in the middle school.
Nelson also shared data on discipline. The numbers of students facing disciplinary action have dropped significantly, in both the high school and middle school.
In the high school, incidents dropped from a high of 105 with 22 suspensions in the 2012-13 school year to a current rate of 26 incidents with 17 suspensions and 1 expulsion.
Middle school numbers have dropped as well, from 261 incidents with 8 suspensions in the 2012-13 school year to 20 incidents to 4 suspensions in 2014-15.
Schwarz noted that the 2012-13 figures might reflect incidents that may or may not have risen to the need for action, but the 2013-14 numbers reflect incidents where the school took some kind of action.
Principal Nelson said things have gotten easier with addition of Career and Guidance Counselor Kris Hoffman to the staff. Nelson said Hoffman and School Social Worker Anna Sandstrom were a good team and they made his work, and that of Elementary Principal Gwen Carman, much easier.
Nelson went through a number of other principal duties and said, “The job is huge and honestly, I don’t know how Principal Carman was able to do the whole shooting match…”
School calendar discussion continues
The school board continues to fine-tune the school calendar for next year. A survey went out to school staff, parents and community members asking for feedback and 122 responses were received. There is debate over a four-or five-day week and whether the day off should be Monday or Friday. Superintendent Schwarz said a frequent comment is that people want consistency on what day is the off day.
Schwarz said the calendar would be on the board agenda again at the March 5 board meeting with the target for adopting a calendar at the March 19 meeting.
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