South Tama County Board of Education, pictured bottom row (l-r): Beth Wiese, Elizabeth Dolezal; top row: Mandy Lekin, Clint Werner and Penny Tyynismaa. -- News Chronicle File Photo

1. In January, Gov. Kim Reynolds announced during her Condition of the State address that teachers in Iowa would be receiving a $1,000 retention bonus paid through the state’s Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funds.

However, once details emerged of how the program would be rolled out, it became clear that not all certified staff would be included in receiving the bonus.

“Once the governor’s proclamation came through it really was not as equitable as it was being presented,” South Tama Director of Finance Randy Denham said. “It really was only certain teachers qualifying. Our nurses, counselors and teacher leaders did not qualify and of course the classified staff were kind of left out in the cold as far as this goes.”

South Tama joined several Iowa districts in providing additional funds so that each school employee that is in good standing and who has worked through the COVID-19 pandemic could receive a retention bonus regardless if they qualified for the direct funding from the state.

Following unanimous approval by the South Tama Board of Education, the district will allocate $1,000 for every staff member that was not included in the state retention bonus. Additionally, all school staff will receive two days of hazard pay from the district to go along with the $1,000 bonus.

South Tama will utilize it’s own ESSER fund to pay for the salary benefits, which will come at a total cost of around $256,000. Once the staff salary benefits are expended the district will have around $1.5 million within their ESSER fund that was provided through federal aid over the past year.

The school is required to utilize $500,000 of the fund to address learning loss that came as a result from the pandemic. Last year an after school program was implemented through ESSER fund dollars that could be broadened, along with summer school initiatives, in the coming year.

The district has until the 2023-24 fiscal year to expend the pandemic aid funds.

Additional options for the fund that have been discussed are to hire additional behavior interventionist positions and to address the HVAC system at the high school.

2. Following voter approval from the March 1 special school election, the school board took action to begin the process of acquiring funding for the upcoming Middle School Project.

During the March 7 meeting the board approved setting March 21 for a public hearing for the proposed issuance of the state sales tax (SAVE) revenue bonds.

A total of $16.5 million in SAVE bonds will be issued. Of that total, $10 million will go toward the Middle School Project, $5.5 million will go toward calling the 2017 high school renovation bonds and $1 million will be set aside in a reserve fund.

The board also approved the Piper Sandler company to act as the financial agent on behalf of the school district as it seeks bids for the recently approved general obligation bonds and SAVE bonds.

3. The board approved a proposal by Middle School Principal Ben Adams requesting the current shared position that is handling 7th and 8th Grade writing as well as the middle school TAG program be split into two different positions. As part of the plan, an open paraprofessional position will not be filled to help make room for the new writing position.

The board accepted resignations from Lon Wilkerson, 8th Grade Boys Basketball Coach; Heather Keen, Special Ed Para and from Matthew Beatty, Elementary ELL Teacher, Middle School Football Coach and Middle School Girls Track Coach.

The board approved the hiring of Margarita Moreno as an Elementary Food Service worker and the volunteer coach application from Nathan Doran who will work with the high school track team.

4. The board approved the school calendar for the 2022-23 school year. The first day of school for students will be on Aug. 23. Winter break will run from Dec. 22 through Jan. 4 with both Jan. 3 and 4 designated as staff professional development days. Parent teacher conferences will be held the week of Oct. 25 and the week of March 14, 2023. There will again be no Spring Break offered but instead a break around the Easter holiday with students off from April 7, 2023 (Good Friday) through Tue., April 11, 2023. The last day of school is planned for May 25.

In other business…

The board will hear a presentation of next year’s budget during their March 21 meeting. The plan will be to hold a public hearing on the budget and to vote on adopting the budget at the April 4 meeting.

Following closure of the application period for the superintendent hiring search, South Tama administration reports that 18 candidates have applied for the opening. This is the same number of applicants the district received in 2018 during the hiring search that brought in current superintendent Jared Smith. The Board of Education will meet in closed session on March 10 to review the candidates with representatives from Grundmeyer Leader Services, the search firm that was contracted by the district to head up the hiring search. The board will select a pool of finalist candidates at a second closed session meeting on March 22. The names of the candidates will be made public following that meeting. The finalist interviews and potential hiring decision will follow on March 29.