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School at the kindergarten through eighth grade level won't be quite as sweet next year in Suttons Bay.
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Ed. note: Glen Lake teacher Don Miller and Suttons Bay director of food service Linda Wrobel are retiring at the conclusion of the school year. Enterprise intern Freddy Hunt profiles Miller below, and Wrobel.
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The Northport Board of Education this week received its first glimpse of the proposed 2008-09 school year budget, which projects a 4.1 percent decrease in overall spending.
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Glen Lake student Emma Cook has launched a month-long drive to raise funds to purchase a new piano for the music department at the school.
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The traditional "Blessing of the Fleet" at the Elmwood Township Marina will be held Saturday morning.
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An architect was hired and the purchase of two school buses authorized last week by the Glen Lake Board of Education.
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Groening receives 3-year contract, $110,000.
A 3-year contract with a 23 percent salary increase was unanimously approved last week by the Glen Lake Board of Education for Superintendent Joan Groening.
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Disciplinary action taken against two male eighth-grade students at Suttons Bay who were involved in a "pants-ing" incident with a female classmate was upheld last week by the district Board of Education.
Parents and family members of the female victim appealed one of two disciplinary decisions made by Superintendent Mike Murray as result of a school investigation. Murray expelled one of the subjects for the remainder of the 2007-08 school year, and issued a 1-month expulsion for the second.
The victim’s group asked that the punishment for the second youth be extended to the remainder of the school year.
Board members accepted public comment on the appeal and retired to a closed-door session as allowed by the Family and Educational Right to Privacy Act to maintain the privacy of the students and families involved. “Pants-ing” refers to forcibly pulling down someone’s pants to embarrass that person.
Although board members were provided pertinent information, such as police reports and witness statements, the closed-session was their first opportunity to discuss the documents together. Following the 25-minute executive session, the board voted to uphold Murray’s decision based on the district’s disciplinary policy.
“There’s a whole list of criteria in place which sets out the conditions under which the board considers readmittance of the expelled student,” Murray said.
The parents of expelled students must reapply for readmittance to the school district. The school board takes several issues into consideration when making a decision, including:
• Impact of the returning student on the school environment.
• Whether the student has a previous record.
• Liability exposure.
• Student behavior during expulsion and attitude toward the incident.
“The board considers whether the student has done everything as directed during the expulsion,” Murray said.
Upon returning for the last 2½ weeks of school, the student disciplined will serve an “in school” suspension in isolation from the victim.
“The victim and the student won’t have an opportunity to mix,” the superintendent said. “This will allow him the opportunity to complete his class work and take exams for final credit.”
Murray said that while the district’s policy doesn’t spell out whether the victim should be allowed to appeal a disciplinary decision, it is important in the appeals process.
“It seems that the perpetrators’ side is the only thing considered (in the policy). The victim should have the right to be heard, too,” he said.
Following last month’s incident, teachers talked with students about personal responsibility and accountability.
“Looking at the situation, many of the things adults do are irresponsible. The advantage with young people is you can go back and talk about the need to think about the consequences of their actions,” Murray said. “This school will hold you accountable for rash or stupid behavior no matter who you are.”
Suttons Bay band teacher Annie Morey is on unpaid medical leave for the remainder of the school year.
Morey, who teaches middle school and high school band, was last at the school for a May 12 concert.
Superintendent Mike Murray said last week he and Morey agreed that time was needed to determine a diagnosis for her ill health. The popular music teacher has been ill at various times since November 2005.
Murray estimated the district has called in a substitute for the band instructor 50 times this school year — nearly one-third the 170 instruction days in the Suttons Bay calendar.
“This will free her up to go wherever she needs to get a diagnosis and determine the underlying cause of her symptoms,” the superintendent said. “It’s a baffling case medically … but we need to know what’s going on.”
Murray said the district has made every attempt to secure music teachers to serve as substitutes in Morey’s absence, but added it’s difficult for students to adjust to different teachers.
“Each teacher has a different musical background and different teaching style and it’s sometimes hard to make the adjustment,” Murray said.
Former Suttons Bay band director Hal Fisher will serve out the remainder of the school year in Morey’s seat.
Consistency in personnel and teaching styles is the long-term goal, he said.
“It’s frustrating because we know what Annie’s capable of when she’s here consistently,” Murray said. “You need to have someone in that seat consistently — every single day.”
Murray said it is hoped that Morey will know more about the cause of her illness by June 15.
News that Leland Public School will benefit from federal impact aid, an entitlement recently secured by the Glen Lake district, was delivered to the school board this week.
Superintendent Mike Hartigan told board members and the audience attending Monday’s monthly meeting that Leland has qualified for state impact aid through the U.S. Department of Education.
The amount and timing of the payment is not known, but news that the district could receive any additional income was welcomed. Glen Lake is expected to receive $1.7 million.
The Department of Education provides awards to school district that have lost property tax revenue as a result of military installations, Indian reservations, and other federal properties. To qualify, districts have to document that the assessed valuation of the (federal) property represents 10 percent or more of the total property in the district at the time (or times) of federal acquisition.
“We qualified by the skin of our teeth at 10.3 percent,” Hartigan said. “North Manitou was key … We’d be out-of-formula if that property was part of our tax base.”
With the help of the county Treasurer and Equalization departments and Leland Township assessor Julie Krombeen, staff members were able to demonstrate the lost tax base.
Though there are still “unknowns” with which to contend, board members agreed to reduce the amount of bonds to be sold to cover costs that do not lie within the uses allowed through the district sinking fund.
Earlier this month, district voters approved a 5-year, .25-mill levy to pay for $600,000 in bonds. As a result of the news about the impact aid, the district plans to sell only $200,000 in bonds this summer to finance the purchase of a new bus, science equipment and technological upgrades. The bonds will be repaid over three years, rather than five as first expected.
The millage levy for to repay the bond sale over three years will be .16 mills, business manager Sandra Potts said.
The millages collected by the district this summer will drop from those projected by Potts due to increases in the taxable property value in the district. The millage to repay the 2001 construction bond will drop from 1.65 mills to 1.47. That decrease, plus the .30 mills for the district’s sinking fund, will change the millage rate from an anticipated 2.02 mills to 1.93 mills.
More “good news” came to the district Monday in the form of a reduction in the anticipated increase in health insurance coverage through Michigan Education Special Services Association (MESSA).
Frank Musto and Rick Ringstrom of MESSA attended the meeting and explained how the group has responded to a new state law that required they provide school districts with claims history needed to secure competitive bids for health insurance. MESSA was sharply criticized for its initial interpretation of the state law and what school districts saw as a failure to comply with the measure, which local school administrators hoped could result in significant savings.
Health insurance costs for Leland, Suttons Bay and Northport — the three county districts that are insured through MESSA — was $1.86 million for the 2006-2007 school year.
Hartigan was initially told that his district would see an 8.79 increase in health insurance costs in 2008-09, but was informed in writing Monday night that the increase will instead be 4.18 percent. Suttons Bay, which was also bracing for a significant increase, will realize an increase of 3.29 percent. Three members of the Suttons Bay Board of Education were in attendance at the monthly meeting, interested in what the MESSA representatives had to say.
“This is great. I was concerned because based on our projections our fund equity ( at the end of the 2008-09 school year) would go below the 6 percent our board feels comfortable with,” Hartigan said.
