North Elementary Closure Confirmed, Resignations Accepted at Sidney School Board Meeting

SIDNEY--The Sidney Board of Education had their regular meeting on April 8, and many items were on the agenda, including the closure of North Elementary School at the end of the school year.

The first order of business after approving the agenda and calling the roll was to recognize Sidney Public Schools Students of the Month for March. The seventh grade winner is Katy Larson, the eight grade winner is Reina Buettenback, the 9th grade winner is Jordynn Schnell, the tenth grade winner is Josette McConnell, the eleventh grade winner is Jayla Long and the twelfth grade winner is Riley Rohm. Each student received a certificate and congratulations from the school board members, plus gift certificates from local Sidney businesses.

Superintendent Andrew Farber next spoke about some issues regarding District Policies 3029-3039, noting that 3030 is a program to get digital medical training and other improvements to the medical staff at the Sidney Public Schools, and other policies were regarding chain of command, petty cash policies and procedures and threat assessment. Farber noted that there will be more meetings on some of these policies in the future.

The board approved a request for the SHS International Travel Club for their 2025 trip to Europe, including England, Holland, France, Italy and Germany. The school system is responsible for bus travel to and from Sidney to Denver International Airport, but not much else. The board approved the trip so the students and people involved could get a jump on planning and raising funds for the trip.

Next, the board accepted the resignation of three Sidney Public Schools employees, Morgan Meier, Lori Jensen and Kelsey Watchorn. All resignations will take effect at the end of the school year. After that, Superintendent Andrew Farber discussed details of the Financial Report, saying that the $150-$200 thousand dollars in bills each moth over the past few months was normal for this time of year. He said the staffing payroll is just at around $8 million dollars, which includes a $289,000 increase in staff salaries. He noted they had collected $9.6 million dollars and have spent $9.4 million. He also noted that the schools have spent 53.93% of their budget, but that amount is normal due to the increased costs of the Spring season, with track meets and golf and other activities. Farber also said that in May, they are expected to get a much larger sum of tax revenue, which will put the budgets where they need to be. Board President Mike Palmer asked why there were clubs at the schools that had negative cash balances, and what was going to be done about them, while board member Deanna Kantor answered that revenues that come in from May and June will take care of the negative club balances. Palmer also asked about a bill for $10,000 for math textbooks, and Kantor answered that the books were delayed and when they arrived, they were returned. The books were double-billed by the vendor, and they re now just waiting for the refund to be issued.

A discussion was held about North Elementary, and the decision was made to move grades to other schools, like the Third Grade moving to South and the Fourth Grade moving to West. Preparations are already being made at North Elementary to accommodate the move, and the administrators have planned in such a way as to minimize any disruption or inconvenience to the students and staff. The board then voted to approve the closure of North Elementary at the end of the school year unanimously, and also unanimously voted to give Superintendent Farber the authority to explore options about either the sale or change of use for the building, and present his findings to the Facilities Committee at a later date.

The board next discussed the progress of the LIMHP Program, which will provide students and their family members access to mental health and well-being treatment in each school. There was discussion on how to fund the new staff member required, but Farber stated it was not something they would have to allocated additional funds for as it is a matter of moving a staff member from part-time to full-time. Currently, the ESU-13 consortium has provided funding and services, but hiring a full-time LIMHP staff member would eliminate the need for the continued assistance of ESU-13. Farber said, "We need to see what kind of applicants we get for the salary we are offering to let ESU-13 know as soon as possible whether or not we will be moving to a full-time staff member. Unfortunately, the funding for this position would be on a year-to-year basis, so the applicants would need to know in advance their position would have to be approved every year, for the time being." The board decided to post the job opening immediately to see the response they get, and then will move forward appropriately.

The board members then gave comments concerning what they've seen in the schools, with board members Rusty Gulbranson and Brenda Smith each saying that the students involved in the performance of "Legally Blonde - The Musical" did a fantastic job and the audiences were thrilled by the performances at all of the shows. Board member Kathy Nienhueser commented on testing scores, showing elementary proficiency scores have improved dramatically in both Math and Reading. The MAP Assessment tests also showed dramatic improvement in Reading and Math scores for Sidney Public School students.

To help accommodate the move out of North elementary, the school board announced that the last day of classes for grades pre-K through sixth grade will now be May 17. This will allow the staff to have a few days to be able to organize and start the moving process out of North Elementary. The board noted that the students will all have far more days and hours in class than required by Nebraska State law, the the early closing does not cause any conflict with state standards.

Board President Mike Palmer announced that the annual Superintendent evaluation was coming up in May, and informed Andrew Farber of the dates when the evaluation processes will be carried out.

Rick Meyer, South Elementary Principal, said that there will be an event held soon at the school like they had this year, but this time, the students will be asked to build something from a bag of scraps. Central Elementary Principal Erin Meyer said the "Rolling Raiders" program looked to double participation compared to last year. She said the biggest challenge comes from Middle and High School students, as the program stresses engagement with family members, and many teens simply hesitant to engage with parents and adults in these events. North Elementary Principal Nancy Rowlett commented that the school's recent STEAM Event had 76 families participate and was a great success. Sidney High School Associate Principal Whitney Hurt said the schools have been making a conscious effort to stay connected to the parents, with text messaging used as the preferred method of communications, but the staff and schools have been very proactive on working with apps or other messaging software to help keep communications open with parents.