The October meeting of the Clarion-Goldfield-Dows Board of Education began Monday night with the reading of a letter from the Kids Korner Board of Directors. The letter officially requested an extension until May of 2024 on the deadline to vacate its present space in the elementary school. The current deadline is May of 2021.
In the letter, the Kids Korner board explains steps they have taken to move out, including forming a committee, exploring partnerships, searching for locations, and meeting with engineers. After making the determination that building a new facility will likely be the best option, the letter lays out a timeline that extends over a couple years for that process. The letter ends by saying, “We want to continue to work diligently in finding a solution that will set the day care up for success and allow us to do our part to help the community grow.” Though the CGD board made a decision on the extension, that information was not made public by press time.
In old business, Superintendent Joe Nelson updated the board on the district’s revised Return to Learn Plan. He explained that according to new rules from the Iowa Department of Public Health, schools are no longer able to share positive COVID results. This means the schools can’t release numbers of COVID cases for the schools. Additionally, new guidance on who has to quarantine mandates that close contacts to a positive person do not have to leave school if they were wearing a mask. (For more on this, see page 16).
Nelson discussed several topics in his superintendent’s report. He noted they have been researching the district’s borrowing capacity for a long-term plan to add a gym. He touched on a few more COVID-related topics including that the state has said that snow days this winter will not have to be made up if the district can provide online instruction on those days. He said that the district will also likely revisit their gym usage policies for outside groups after the first of the year.
Nelson said that preliminary enrollment numbers for the district are trending down, showing 26 fewer students this year. He attributes this loss to various factors including more homeschooling and some students entering the workforce.
In other board business, they approved resignations for Macoy Rohrer for MS/JV Softball. Work agreements and contracts were approved for John Koenig (Bus Driver), Deb Watts (PT Nutrition), Theresa McGivern (MS Boys Track), Gary Anderson (JV Girls Basketball), and Patty Stockman-Sann (Concession Stand Advisor).
The board’s next meeting is scheduled for November 9. The November and December meetings will be held on Zoom.
