Pork and beef donated to Banner County School

This month’s Banner County School board covered numerous issues with decisive understanding of both the school and county’s needs.

While reviewing the thorough accounting from Lana Sides, Superintendent, of the school’s first month’s spending, Sides discussed a few new purchases for the school.

Sides negotiated for five fold-up lunchroom tables at a vastly discounted price from another school. Principal Charles Jones believes these tables will greatly enhance the schools ability to clean the floors and rearrange for different events. To completely furnish the lunchroom, another three to five will need to be purchased. These tables have chairs attached and should significantly help with seating issues.

New uniforms were purchased for junior high wrestling and high school track.

Spanish as a second language curriculum materials were purchased so that the school may offer this class as a distant learning option.

Sides reported that Nathaniel McGowan donated two pork and Grant Lerwick donated one beef for their “Serving Locally Grown Meat” program.

A handmade electric guitar, in Banner County blue on blue colors, was presented at the meeting by Sides. The guitar was handmade at VALTS (Valley Alternative Learning Transitional School) during the 2015-16 school year in the math department using various mathematical techniques including calculus. The students worked together in groups to make one guitar for every school district represented at VALTS. One student from Banner county attended VALTS last school year. The guitar will be used in the music department by the Banner students.

In old business, teacher negotiations was scheduled for October 17 at 5 p.m. and the policy review meeting was set for September 19 at 5 p.m.

Then the board moved onto new business. First item to be addressed was the budget hearing for 2016-17. The final proposed tax request was set at $2,922,137.34 compared to $2,726,679.00 for the 2015-16 year. Although the actual tax rate of 0.952710 remained the same for both years, when the lower property valuations are considered, the 2015-16 tax rate would seem more like 0.888984 today. Although the tax request was approved unanimously, it was not passed without much consideration by all board members.

The superintendent’s report notified the board that the school is in need of a girls basketball coach and a speech coach. Sides also reported that there have been $176,000 in claims so far from the hailstorm, however that does not include the necessary painting yet to be done.

Charles Jones then presented the principal’s report. He notified the board that according to state regulations, all juniors and seniors will be required to take the ACT starting this year. Previously, students were required to take the Nebraska State Accountability (NeSA) test which is being discontinued as its purpose was to gauge whether students were achieving the minimum levels of proficiency for state standards. According to the Nebraska Department of Education, the ACT would cost less, better matches the academic content, will cost the state less than the SAT and will provide a better overall view of how well Nebraska students are being prepared for college.

The meeting then adjourned and the next meeting of the Banner County School board was set for October 10 at 7 p.m.