Week 20: The Winter Season

Happy Friday!

I want to begin by thanking our transportation department, especially all drivers, who struggled through the snow on Tuesday to get our students safely delivered home! Several of our staff members were out until after 5 pm Tuesday rescuing buses stuck in the snow: James Davis, Shane Torix, Danny Minton, Justin Head, Jason Hendrix, Josh Starr, and Alicia Moody. I want to thank all of them for what they did.

I also want to recognize the work that Alicia Moody has done in learning and using our Transfinder and Samsara software. Now, all of our bus routes have been GPS tracked and mapped so that we can view all of our routes in real-time on a map similar to Google Maps. Along with the new radios, this helped us track where buses were and if they were moving or not.

The weather did not do what the forecasters predicted, which caused us a lot of trouble. But with the help of our new systems and those who were willing to get out in the snow to pull buses to safety, no one was hurt and there was no serious damage to our equipment.

Due to the shortened week, I do not have much new information to put in this Wrap-up but I will update you on a few things.

Discipline

It has been noted each week that our district goal for discipline is ahead of schedule by more than 20 percent compared to last year at this time. We have attributed that to the work being done in the buildings using the BX3 system, creating behavior matrices, positive behavioral interventions, and tracking the data. I want to break down the data further by category in today’s Wrap-up comparing the number of incidences in the 21-22 school year that have changed the most this year up to Week 19:

* Bus infractions last year, 228, and this year, 182.

* Disorderly Conduct last year, 56, and this year, 25.

* Disregard of Directions last year, 32, and this year, 18.

* Fighting last year, 16, and this year, 7.

* Tardies last year, 54, and this year, 21.

There is one category in which we are seeing an increase and that is Tobacco/Vaping, last year 16, and this year, 22.

Rates of Detention have gone from 42 to 17; In-school Suspension from 248 to 210; Out-of-School Suspension from 42 to 26; and, the ‘Other’ category has dropped from 82 to 18.

Improving discipline increases learning and we are continually looking for ways to make these numbers even better. We will soon be sharing news about another discipline system we are developing in partnership with our juvenile justice system which we are excited about. But there is no system that can overcome or replace the relationships between teachers and their students. Thank you for all the work you have done to make those relationships positive because your efforts are proving to be effective.

Legislative

Thank you for your comments on Governor Sanders’ LEARNS initiative. Here is a link to what has been commented thus far and a link to the Thought Exchange for any new remarks you have. I am also providing a list of newly added bills of interest.

* HB1204 - Requires private schools to administer an annual statewide assessment; Requires private schools to admit any student that applies for admission and intends to cover private school costs with state funding. We would like this amended to include homeschooled students if accepting state funding. This bill is being supported.

* SB81 - Amends the law concerning obscene material creating the offense of furnishing harmful items to minors. This bill would remove existing protections for public school staff and librarians surrounding material the bill defines as being harmful to minors and requires mandated reporters to hotline anyone who provided such materials to a minor.

* HB 1122 - Following an amendment, this bill restores the school start date to the week of August 19th and repeals the prohibition of districts requesting an Act 1240 Waiver of the school start date. The amendment removed the language repealing the use of hours instead of days for student contact days when establishing the district calendar from the bill. This bill has passed both chambers and should be delivered to the Governor by next week.

* HB 1205 - This bill would require any school, whether public or private, that receives public funds to provide transportation to any attending student within thirty-five (35) miles.

* HB 1268 - This bill provides for a $10,000 salary increase for teachers, increases the base teacher salary schedule in future years to $50,000, and provides funding.

* SB 172 - The bill would redefine recess to be a non-instructional duty for purposes of counting towards the maximum sixty (60) minutes per week teachers may perform without receiving additional compensation.

Remember, this is just a short list of bills that may directly affect teachers or classified staff. If you want to view the entire list of bills related to education you may visit the Arkansas State Legislature webpage.

Closing

We have home basketball games tonight and are getting closer to the spring sports beginning. Congratulations to Ladycat Basketball for breaking into the Arkansas High School Sports Network Class 4A Top 10 this week!

We are very happy for our classified staff members in the REACH program who made the Dean’s List for the fall semester: Caleb Tilley, Jamie Grogan, Jordan Bailey, LaShea Holder, Melody Rowe, and Stacy Green!

There are still about thirty employees who have not completed their intent form for next year.

The 2023-2024 Mena Public Schools official calendar options should be released next week.

Thank you for all you have done this week and have a great weekend!

At Mena Public Schools our students are prepared, our staff is supported, and our community is confident.