By Patrick Andrews
The Monday, September 18 Kingsland School Board meeting primarily covered the upcoming ICS facilities assessment, policy adoption, a vacant school board seat, a new school logo, and levy certification.
Kingsland Schools will soon be adopting a new school logo design. School board members expressed their intent to reserve its reproduction within the district but acknowledged that it will be difficult to prevent third parties from using the logo. According to the superintendent, the logo took years to develop.
The school board is currently looking for someone willing to fill the role of school board clerk, the position vacated last month by Carmen Anderson. The position’s responsibilities are currently being taken up by Steve Tammel. The board may begin reaching out for volunteers; otherwise, the position is up for election next November
The first reading of school policy 601 was “reluctantly approved.” The policy addresses the requirements of a a new Minnesota state statute120B.11, which according to school materials “requires school districts to adopt a comprehensive long-term
Photo by Patrick Andrews
strategic plan that addresses the review of curriculum, instruction, student achievement, and assessment.” Part of the new school policy includes defining words such as “antiracist,” “institutional racism,” and “culturally sustaining,” the last of which, according to the state statute, means “integrating content and practices that infuse the culture and language of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities who have been and continue to be harmed and erased through the education system.” School policies require approval of a first and second reading before being formally adopted. The second reading of policy 601 has yet to be completed.
A motion was carried to certify the maximum school tax levy. A common decision for many public school districts, this means that, pending a final decision following a “truth in taxation” meeting in December, Kingsland School District will accept whatever the maximum tax levy will be collected on its behalf by Fillmore County. Information including school enrollment will be provided by Kingsland School District to the State of Minnesota and Department of Education, who will provide Fillmore County with the tax numbers they are to charge Kingsland School District residents.
A special meeting will be held Monday, October 30 to discuss the ICS long-term facilities planning study. The meeting will be open to the public, and community members are strongly encouraged to attend and bring their questions. ICS is a Legence company; Legence, a Blackstone portfolio company, “provides advisory services and implementation focused on financing, designing, building, and servicing complex systems in mission-critical and high-performance facilities.” ICS has been conducting a two-pronged study for Kingsland public schools.
The study’s first prong involves a comprehensive assessment of Kingsland school facilities with the intent to develop a 10-year facilities budget and plan. Each year, the school is required to reassess and update its 10-year facilities budget. The second prong of the study will gather demographic data from the communities in Kingsland public school district. This will generate a set of data from which Kingsland School District officials can better understand the numbers of and financial needs of potential school enrollees, funding potentially available to the school district based on such information, as well as general information on economic dynamics of the local communities.
In the weeks leading up to the October 30 meeting, ICS will be reviewing their findings with Kingsland School District employees. The meeting, which will be open to the public, will be held at 6 p.m. in the high school choir room. Comprehensive data will be assembled, and superintendent Scott Klavetter was emphatic that members of the public be encouraged to attend and bring questions.
A closed section of the board meeting reviewed the superintendent evaluation.
The next regular school board meeting will be held Monday October 16 at 6 p.m. in the Kingsland Elementary School conference room. The next work session will be held Monday, October 2 in the same location.
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