Month: June 2021

The Kansas City, Kansas, Board of Education voted today to approve seven assistant principal positions at middle schools and high schools.

The vote was unanimous, 6-0, to approve the positions. The board met in an online meeting that began at 3 p.m., and discussed several budget issues.

The board also approved an expanded position, associate superintendent of teaching and learning, on a 5-1 vote. It is an existing position that is being upgraded, Dr. Alicia Miguel, interim superintendent, said.

She said they are bringing all areas of instruction, including curriculum and instruction, Diploma Plus, instructional learning officers and special education, under this associate superintendent. The change will allow the district to expand support and supervision, bringing them under one person, she said.

Dr. Valdenia Winn, a school board member who also is a state representative, voted against the expanded associate superintendent position, saying while she was excited about the position, her constituents were concerned about increasing executive salaries, and she believes this change would cause an increase in salaries.

The proposed budget listing included an additional $17,000 for the position.

The cost for the seven assistant principal positions will be around $627,000, according to Dr. Alicia Miguel, interim superintendent. The positions are in the $89,000 range.

Five of the assistant principals will be assigned to middle schools, and two to high schools, Dr. Miguel said.

She added the positions needed to be approved now, because often these positions are filled within the district, leaving other vacancies the district needs to fill.

Dennis Covington, chief financial officer for the school district, said the assistant principals would be added at Central, Gloria Willis, Carl Bruce, Rosedale and Arrowhead middle schools, and at Washington and Wyandotte high schools. The other middle schools, Eisenhower and Argentine, already have an additional assistant principal, he said.

District officials said the assistant principals were added after building principals were surveyed and said there was a need for them. The proposal went through the superintendent’s cabinet for review before it was presented to the school board.

The school board continued to discuss the budget for the next school year, and the entire budget is not final at this time.

There is a proposed salary increase of 3 percent for classified and certified staff, and those figures are not yet final.

Another proposal to the budget would increase pay for paras, aides and support staff to bring their pay closer to $15 an hour. There also is a proposal to give holiday pay for five holidays to those who do not work at least 261 days a year.

Another proposal is to give a 5 percent salary increase to those who are bilingual, in a language needed in the school district, according to district officials.

There were also a couple of new positions to help staff and students who were having technology issues with their tablets or other devices. Additional assistance with technology was one of the priorities mentioned by principals, according to Covington.

Lisa Walker, the district’s executive director of federal programs, gave a presentation on evidence-based continuous improvement, and described the needs the district discovered after talking with building leaders. Technology that either didn’t work correctly or took too long to fix was a fairly common concern district-wide, according to Walker. She described the process of analyzing problems and finding solutions.

An additional $1.5 million was put in the budget for textbooks, according to Covington.

Covington also reported that employer health insurance premiums were expected to increase around 5 percent this year, costing the district $1 million. District employees also may have to pay more for insurance.

A challenge for the board and district this year is that some new provisions were passed in laws that require many expenditures to be directly related to programs for student academic outcomes, according to board members.

Some allocation of resources will be directly linked to student academic outcome, according to Dr. Miguel.

The district adopted the “5 Whys” process and identified goals for each process to happen, she said. They are looking at outcomes and processes in a different way, but are using the same model to evaluate their efficiency, she said.

The school board members recently listed their first budget priority as student achievement, Covington said.

According to Covington, the district’s state approved budget received a $5.1 million increase, and the mill levy change approved by the board adds $4.1 million. Last month, the school board approved a plan to refinance bonds and raise the local option budget authority to 33 percent, which would not increase the overall property tax rate but would provide an additional $4.1 million, according to Covington.

See earlier story at https://wyandotteonline.com/kck-school-board-votes-to-refinance-bonds-raise-lob-authority-to-33-mills/.