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West Carroll School Board Hears from State Finance Consultant

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ATWOOD (February 7) — The West Carroll School Board met in a lengthy session beginning with a workshop during which they heard a presentation from Brad Davis, Finance Consultant with the State Department of Education.
Davis was there at the request of Director of Schools Dexter Williams. He went over the state’s BEP works and the responsibility of the school board and director of schools as it relates to the budgeting process.
BEP is the program/formula used to determine how education funds are distributed to schools in the state. Davis also went through the different line items in the budget. He discussed the difference between general purpose, federal, school nutrition, debt service and the endowment fund.  He was very complimentary of how the board and school system have managed their money.
Following Davis’s presentation, the regular meeting began with the annual audit report from Winston Truett with Alexander Thompson Arnold.
The audit report showed no major adverse findings but revealed a couple of very minor issues. Truett agreed with Davis that the school system was in excellent shape financially and also is in excellent shape with their pension plan and was also complimentary of how the system funded their plan.
During the spotlight portion of the meeting, Primary School Principal Jackie Wester, recognized Jonathan Wheeler for the work he does with the primary school music program. He has been a member of the West Carroll staff since 2002.
Elementary Principal Tracy Foster announced the spelling bee winners for third, fourth, and fifth grades. Jr. High/Sr. High Principal Tim Stratton spotlighted the FBLA award winners from their recent competition at Union University.
The board took action on several items during the session including a number of field trips.
The board approved the first reading of a field trip request for students to attend the HOSA competition and convention in Chattanooga March 24-27. The first reading of a field trip request for band students to attend the All-West Tennessee Band Convention in Memphis, Feb. 14-16.

Due to the trip date being so close, the board also waived the second reading.
Board members approved the first reading of a field trip for students to attend the 2019 Jr. Beta Convention in Oklahoma City, June 14-18. Crystal Polinski, Beta Club co-sponsor, commented that this was the first time a group this age had qualified to compete at the National Convention. A field trip request for students to attend the FCCLA State Competition in Chattanooga, March 19-22 was approved on first reading as well as the second reading of a field trip request to the FBLA Conference March 10-13 also in Chattanooga.
In other actions, the board approved the purchase of Edgepoint, a new student information system. They also approved two board policy updates.
One was the second reading of an update regarding maintaining test and data security and the other was the first reading of updates to sections one, two, and three. At the recommendation of School Director Dexter Williams, the board approved a resolution opposing publicly funded vouchers.
According to Williams, these vouchers would take funds away from the school system. The board gave approval to let bids on cameras to be placed in needed areas of the school.
There was much discussion on renovating restrooms at the Jr. High/Sr. High building. There are 8 restrooms in the building which haven’t been renovated in some time. Maintenance Supervisor John Hartz told the board he had spoken to The Marble Shop which specializes in this area.
They recommended molded fixtures and offered a price with and without faucets. $1,500 without faucets, and $1,770 with faucets. The discussion centered around timing of the renovations. The total price is approximately $14,160 and Hartz indicated there were options on when the job could be completed.
The options included doing it all at once, doing some now and some during the summer to split the expenditure between this year and next school year. Most board members liked the idea of waiting until school was out to perform the work until graduation was brought up. After further discussion, the board approved doing the two restrooms nearest the gym at a cost of $3,540 and wait until a later time on the remaining restrooms.
Some discussion took place on beginning the process of working on a five-year district strategic plan. Director Williams suggested beginning with scheduling meetings for public input and then seeking input from the staff during faculty and staff meetings. Willams agreed to coordinate meeting dates with the board members so they could participate in the input process.
During the meeting board members received gifts of appreciation from each of the schools in honor of School Board Appreciation Week.

West Carroll, School, State Finance