The Eastern Pulaski School Board members approved a resolution to move from a recognized fiscal year budget to a calendar year budget.
Superintendent Dan Foster explained the school corporation is one of two school corporations in the state that operate on a fiscal year budget which is from July 1 to June 30. All other school corporations in the state follow a calendar year budget which is from January to December.
The Eastern Pulaski School Corporation will not be receiving a levy for their capital projects plan this year, according to Superintendent Dan Foster. He told WKVI that the Department of Local Government Finance has informed them that they need to decrease their capital projects funding, dropping their levy for that fund.
Teachers at the Eastern Pulaski School Corporation received a nice surprise recently, as the school board this week approved a stipend payment thanks to an unexpected increase in student enrollment. Superintendent Dan Foster said the influx was a nice surprise, especially since the corporation has seen very few raises over the last few years.
Foster said this increase in students brought with it an increase in funds, and they decided to give it back to the teachers.
“The Service Center now has a way to do it that’s been approved by the State Board of Accounts,” explained Foster. “Basically, it’s an online way to receive your bus bids. You’re going to receive bids from the same two or three companies that would have normally would have submitted to you anyway. It’s just going to save our folks in the office a little bit of time.”
This takes the place of the old format of listing specifications and sending it to a newspaper and receiving bids within a certain amount of time.
Once bids have been received, the board will approve a recommended bid.
The Eastern Pulaski School Board approved a motion to replace the sound system in the middle school gym.
Superintendent Dan Foster stressed that the system has been very useful for the facility but it’s outdated.
“Dave DeLorenzo and the maintenance staff have had a lot of trouble with the sound system and it’s just an old system that needs some updating. We’re going to have that replaced,” explained Foster.
The system will be replaced in the next few months.
Superintendent Dan Foster said the change in leadership at the corporation had delayed this process, but the board forged ahead with approving all contracts.
“We did go ahead and extend all of the principal’s contracts and the Athletic Director’s contract for an extra year,” explained Foster. “Their contracts are effective June 30, 2015 now instead of just this next summer.”
Superintendent Dan Foster explained that the school corporation isn’t on the same budget schedule as the majority of school systems in the state.
The ISTEP+ results have been looked at by officials at all schools in our area and Knox Community School Superintendent said there were some positive points and areas that need to be worked on.
“There were some good points and some points that need to be looked at,” explained Gappa. “In the elementary school, the average in both Language Arts and Math were in the upper nineties – the high point being the fifth grade Math with over 90 percent. The middle school had a little bit lower results and those will be checked out and we’ll report to the board at the next meeting.”
The Eastern Pulaski School Board did formally approve a recommendation to withdraw from the Midwest Athletic Conference. Eastern Pulaski now joins eight other schools in the area in making that decision.
In this first meeting for newly-hired Superintendent Dan Foster, he will give tentative enrollment figures, discuss the ISBA Regional Meeting and other items to come before the school board. The building principals will also give reports.
The Eastern Pulaski School Board will meet at 5:30 p.m. ET in the distance learning lab on the school’s campus.
