Galion BOE recognizes students, volunteers, good samaritans

By Matt Echelberry

Inquirer Reporter

The Galion Board of Edu­ca­tion held a spe­cial work ses­sion meet­ing on Oct. 25. Board Pres­i­dent Den­nis Long was absent.

A lot of par­ents, stu­dents and com­mu­nity mem­bers were in atten­dance because the Board wished to rec­og­nize sev­eral indi­vid­u­als. Super­in­ten­dent Dr. Kathy Jen­ney and Board Vice Pres­i­dent Jen­nifer Kuns handed out sev­eral cer­tifi­cates of recog­ni­tion (see below for indi­vid­ual names).

The girls’ ten­nis team was rec­og­nized because it was 12–0 in its con­fer­ence and won the NCC championship.

The vol­un­teers for two recent projects were also rec­og­nized. First for the instal­la­tion of the new vis­i­tor side bleach­ers at Unkrich Sta­dium, which Jen­ney reported saved the dis­trict $12,000 through the use of vol­un­teers. The other project was the paint­ing done at the foot­ball field for the game against Wyn­ford, in which tiger strip­ing was put on the end zones and a ‘G’ emblem on the 50-yardline.

Those who helped dur­ing an emer­gency sit­u­a­tion were also rec­og­nized. On a bus ride from Pio­neer recently, there was an inci­dent in which a stu­dent needed med­ical atten­tion. Bus dri­ver Vicki Teer­man said four stu­dents stepped up to aide her dur­ing the situation.

“Thank you for being there, it really shows what you’re all about,” Jen­ney said to the students.

After the pre­sen­ta­tion, the Board con­tin­ued with its reg­u­lar busi­ness. Trea­surer Terri Day pre­sented her Five year fore­cast. By her esti­ma­tion, the dis­trict will be in the red by end of next school year.

In superintendent’s rec­om­men­da­tions, the Board approved a con­tin­u­ing con­tract for Brent Tyrell, a pro­mo­tion for DiAnna Dan­ner and a con­tract for Kevin Wechter as a sub­sti­tute cus­to­dian and maintenance/mechanic. It also accepted the res­ig­na­tion of Christina Boehler as a high school cook.

In agree­ments, the Board approved a con­tract with Mid Ohio Edu­ca­tional Ser­vice Cen­ter for instruc­tional tech­nol­ogy pro­fes­sional devel­op­ment in the amount of $3,250 (to be paid with grant funds.

It also approved Stu­dent Dis­abil­ity con­tracts with Mount Gilead and Ontario schools, for Galion res­i­dent stu­dents who are edu­cated at those insti­tu­tions, as well as a Span­ish Enrich­ment Ser­vice con­tract with Car­olina Mar­tinez Karam, to be paid from the Galion Com­mu­nity Edu­ca­tion Foun­da­tion Grant.

In cur­ricu­lum, it approved a sec­ond read­ing for changes to Mid­dle School read­ing, math and tech­nol­ogy electives.

The Board also approved a res­o­lu­tion accept­ing the amounts and rates as deter­mined by the Bud­get Com­mis­sion to autho­rize and cer­tify the nec­es­sary tax rates to the county auditor.

In the work ses­sion top­ics, David Smith from the Brewer Gar­rett Com­pany dis­cussed energy sav­ings for the dis­trict. Brewer Gar­rett offers ser­vices to increase energy effi­ciency for com­mer­cial, edu­ca­tional, gov­ern­men­tal, health­care and indus­trial institutions.

Pre­vi­ously the com­pany came to the High School and installed energy-efficient light­ing, enhanced energy meter­ing and altered vend­ing machine energy con­sump­tion. Smith pre­sented a pre­lim­i­nary energy audit based on energy bills at the High School build­ing for the past few months.

He reported that, because of the changes, the dis­trict can expect an annual guar­an­tee of $40, 451 in energy savings.

He rec­om­mended the Board con­sider the instal­la­tion of a co-generation micro-turbine at the High School. If installed, Smith said there would be no change in the power oper­a­tion, but all of the waste heat pro­duced would be put back into use. He pre­dicted that the tur­bine could pro­duce 42 per­cent of the building’s heat­ing needs, reduc­ing the district’s energy bills even further.

As far as pay­ing for the instal­la­tion, Smith explained that House Bill 264, passed in 1985, allows school dis­tricts to bor­row money for energy ren­o­va­tions, which could cover the cost of the project.

The next topic for the work ses­sion was the district’s tax levy. Jen­ney reminded the Board that there will be three com­mu­nity meet­ings held to pro­vide more infor­ma­tion about the levy and why it is needed. (See the insert in today’s issue of the Inquirer.)

The Ohio Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion released its dis­trict report card data on Oct. 17. Dr. Sandy Pow­ell, direc­tor of cur­ricu­lum, went over the results. Galion City Schools received an “effec­tive” rat­ing as a dis­trict and at the High School, as well as an “excel­lent with dis­tinc­tion” rat­ing for the Mid­dle School.

She also went over ACT data, which was included in the ODE report card this year. She com­pared the district’s results with state aver­ages, which showed that Galion rates higher than most of the averages.

In response, Pow­ell devel­oped sev­eral Dis­trict Account­abil­ity Goals for this school year so that the dis­trict can improve.

Megan Thomp­son, the stu­dent rep­re­sen­ta­tive, reported that stu­dents are com­plain­ing that they can­not print in the library, which is espe­cially a prob­lem for post-secondary students.

The prob­lem has arisen due to a district-wide phas­ing out of laser print­ers. Jen­ney explained that, as a result of the tran­si­tion to new print­ers, the library printer has not yet been replaced but hopes it will be soon.

The next reg­u­lar Board of Edu­ca­tion meet­ing is Nov. 8 at 6:30 p.m. A spe­cial meet­ing was set for Nov. 29 at 5 p.m. and the Dec. 13 meet­ing was changed to Dec. 12 at 6:30 p.m. All of them are held at the Mid­dle School Com­puter Lab.

***

Recog­ni­tion of Girls Ten­nis Team for Out­stand­ing NCC Record 2012: Kelsey Cas­sady, Sara Cas­sady, Raven Craw­ford, Sierra John­son, Kayla LaFor­est, Don­netta Lester and Kate­lyn Smith. Coached by Bob Roesch and Terry Gribble.

Recog­ni­tion of the safe care in an emer­gency bus sit­u­a­tion: Bus Dri­vers Vicki Teer­man and Linda Hiatt; Stu­dents Alexan­dria Baker, Elaine Finch, Jes­sica Ire­land, Makaela Keen and Mer­rick Swango.

Recog­ni­tion of the vol­un­teer work of the fol­low­ing indi­vid­u­als for the Vis­i­tor Bleacher Instal­la­tion Project: Jacob Burgess, Lupe Campo, Scott Campo, Rod­ney Dean, Lee Kim­ber­lin, Tim McDaniel, Jerry McEl­hat­ten, Jim Meyer, Randy Moritz, Larry Palmer, Tony Tan­ner and Stan Wal­ters (vol­un­teers), and Bill Hur­low, Jeff Ship­man and Joe Tucker (main­te­nance staff).

Recog­ni­tion of the vol­un­teer work of the fol­low­ing indi­vid­u­als for the Paint­ing Project: Chad Early, Scott Eck­ert, Nate Lovely and Kyle Parsons.

Posted by Matt Echelberry on Oct 31 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.