Anna Jonesboro Community High School District 81 Board met March 16.
Here is the minutes provided by the board:
Upon roll call at 6:03 p.m. the following members were present: Mrs. Teske, Mr. Osman, Mr. Hughey, Dr. Blakely, Mr. Partridge, and Mr. McGrath. Also present was Superintendent Wright, Mr. Finders, and Mr. Detering.
On motion by Mr. Partridge and seconded by Mr. McGrath to approve the Agenda as written. All members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Hughey and seconded by Mr. Osman to approve the Consent Agenda which contained the following items: approval of board minutes on 2/10/20; approval of closed session minutes; approval of payment for bills, acceptance of financial reports, renewing of IHSA membership and resignations of Richard Stout as custodian, Natalie Miller and Lyndsey Walls as Student Council sponsors, and Lenore Ashby as Board Member. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
Mrs. Stevens and Mr. Dawley represented the teachers. The items of interest presented were as follows: On Thursday, February 20th, the math department attended the 35th Annual Conference on Teaching Mathematics held at John A Logan College. While there they were able to attend sessions covering: Solving Equation - Fundamental Insights from Many Cultures, The power in assessment for learning, Math tasks with productive struggle, Line values of trigonometric functions - A geometric approach to discovering properties and graphs, Effective differentiation in mathematics, and assessment in the classroom. Information from these sessions were shared among the math teachers and they are currently working on ways to implement some of those ideas into their current classroom. The Math Team competed at the ICTM Regional Math Team Contest on Saturday, February 22nd. The Math Team finished in 2nd place. The Freshman/Sophomore 8 Man Team qualified for the state math team contest at the University of Illinois on May 2nd. The Math Team will next compete at SIUC Math Field Day on March 17th and at SEMO Math Field Day on April 16th. Mrs. Stevens’s accounting class attended the SIUC Accounting Challenge on February 21. Students were tested based on their knowledge of accounting principles and procedures. They also participated in team events that day. Mrs. Stevens attended the ILTS Conference in Springfield on March 2-3 working with ISBE and Pearson on developing standards for future business educators. Attendees also came up with the criteria for a pass/fail grade on content area tests. FBLA is scheduled to attend the state leadership conference April 3-4. Six students are attending. Some of the events are prejudged, so we are waiting to hear results of when students will be presenting at state. Results will start populating on March 17. Students in Mrs. Stevens’s PLTW CSE class have been learning several different programming languages. As of late students have been working with VEX programming blocks to program Self Driving Vehicles. Students were able to present some of their work during the 8th grader tour. These SDV’s have been programmed to identify color, interact with each other, and even travel down some of the hallways here at AJ. The counseling department hosted the incoming freshmen (Class of 2024) on Friday, 2/20. The event seemed to go very well. The students were greeted by the cheerleaders, mascot, and band when they arrived, watched a welcome video put together by seniors Julia Lasley & Mikayla Bundren, heard from various teachers and clubs, saw a sneak preview of the musical, heard the concert choir, toured the building, and chose classes for their freshman year. The follow-up event, Freshman Fair will be 3/19 from 6-7:30 pm. This year it will be organized slightly differently, with the math, science, and English departments giving presentations. The counseling office is in the midst of scheduling and hopes to have schedules complete within the next few weeks. They are also working on the final preparations for the state testing day on 4/14. Beta Club represented A-J well at the state convention on March 5th and 6th. The top results of AJ students are as follows: Quiz Bowl team- 1st- Connor Hallam, Pete Hauser, Soren Keller, & Ethan Palmer; Engineering- 1st- Braden Benns, Soren Keller, Ethan Klett, & Noah McFarland; Service Learning Showcase- 3rd- Olivia Bowen, Olivia Capel, Lexie Lingle, & Kyleigh Matuszewich; Morgan Keller- 1st- Language Arts, Ellie Moore- 1st- Spanish, Olivia Bowen- 1st- recyclable art and woodworking, Jenna Watkins- 2nd- Creative Writing, Lily Yana- 2nd-speech, Connor Hallam- 3rd- Math, Sally Sims- 3rd- painting, Lexie Lingle- 3rd-fiber arts. Students were accompanied by sponsor, Mrs. Penninger, her student teacher, Ms. Hummel, and Mrs. Frownfelter. A-J Music Department students competed on March 7th at the IHSA Solo and Ensemble Contest, hosted at Carbondale High School. The students brought home a collective 11 Superior ratings and 10 excellent ratings, and two of the student performances were awarded the top honor of “Best of the Day” performance from their judges. The A-J Concert Choir will compete in IHSA Organizational Contest next month in the division of jazz choir. Congratulations to Kyleigh Hamel for winning 1st place in the VFW Patriotic Art Contest. This is a county wide competition. Her drawing will go on to compete at the state level. Congratulations also to Faith Glasford who took 3rd in this contest. Results are in for the One Great State Art Exchange. This is a collaborative effort between the Art Institute of Chicago, the American Library Association, and the Illinois Library Association. The competition was the brainstorm of Cheryl Russell, Executive Director of Corporate, Foundation, Government, and Civic Relations (The School of the Art Institute of Chicago) and Josh Scherer (district 37 and VP of the IL Art Education Association) Students were to address the First Amendment in some aspect to apply to a work of art that they would take several months to complete. Winners of this contest were awarded an all-expense paid two week summer camp experience at SAIC. Katie Jo Kirk and Ana Markovic both completed all of the requirements and both WON the competition. Their work will go on tour in the IL library system.
Mr. Finders presented information about Standardized Testing, ISA, and Dual Credit Quality Act MPA.
Principal Detering presented information on enrollment, cafeteria, discipline, freshman fair, parent teacher conferences, the spring musical, and Outstanding Students (Braden Benns, Julia Lasley, Soren Poulos-Keller, Cheyenne Roach, Drake Roach, Steen Vaca-Diez).
Superintendent Wright presented his administrative report. Mr. Wright informed the board on the recent developments related to the Coronavirus situation. He also informed the board that he will need training on new members to have on file for the ROE. He also reminded everyone IASB Dinner Meeting is this Wednesday March 18, 2020 has been cancelled.
On motion by Dr. Blakely and seconded by Mr. Hughey for the Board to enter into closed session at 6:41 p.m. for the following reasons (1) the purpose of appointment, employment, compensation, discipline, performance, or dismissal of specific employee of the public body or legal counsel for the public body, including hearing testimony on a complaint lodged against an employee of the public body or against legal counsel for the public to determine its validity. 5ILCS 120/2(c)(1) Student disciplinary cases. 5 ILCS 120/2(c)(9) Roll Call Vote: On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Partridge and seconded by Mr. Osman to return to regular session at 8:25 p.m. On roll call all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Dr. Blakely and seconded by Mr. McGrath to approve the renewal of Brett Detering (Principal) contract as presented. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Hughey and seconded by Mr. Partridge to approve the renewal of Brien Moore (Maintenance Director) contract as presented. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Dr. Blakely and seconded by Mr. Hughey to approve the renewal of Brian Meyer (Technology Coordinator) contract as presented. On roll call, Hughey, Blakely, Teske, McGrath and Partridge voting yes, Osman voting no. Motion carried.
On motion by Dr. Blakely and seconded by Mr. Partridge to approve the renewal of Heather Craig (Administrative Assistant) contract as presented. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Hughey and seconded by Dr. Teske to approve the bid by Wissinger on the Parking Lot/District Office Improvement Project. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Osman and seconded by Mr. Partridge to grant tenure for Michelle Stevens, Natalie Miller, and Grace Darmour-Paul. All members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Dr. Teske and seconded by Mr. Osman to hire Katherine Barkley as School Social Worker. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Dr. Blakely and seconded by Mr. McGrath to hire Kara James as Math Teacher. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Hughey and seconded by Mr. Osman to hire Amanda Marggraf as Special Education Teacher. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Osman and seconded by Mr. Partridge to approve motion to expel Student J for two years from March 16, 2020 to March 15, 2022, based on the Board’s determination that the student engaged in egregious conduct and that the student’s continued presence at school poses a threat to school safety of other students and staff. The Board further finds that given the severity of the student’s misconduct, there are no other appropriate disciplinary interventions available and that the presence of the student at school will foster a culture that the student’s behavior at school is acceptable or tolerated. Further, that the student’s expulsion shall be held in abeyance and he is eligible to apply for enrollment in an alternative school pending space availability. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Partridge and seconded by Mr. Hughey to approve adding steps and handrails as needed for bleacher repairs. On roll call, all members present voting yes. Motion carried.
On motion by Mr. Hughey and seconded by Dr. Teske to adjourn the Regular Meeting at 8:52 p.m. All members present voting yes. Motion carried.
https://aj81.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/March-2020-Minutes.pdf
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