The District 58 Board of Education held its regular business meeting on Monday, Aug. 8, 2016. Highlights from the meeting include:
Superintendent’s Report:
- Hillcrest Playground: District 58 is incredibly proud of the community’s collaborative efforts to bring DuPage County’s first all-accessible public school playground to Hillcrest School. The playground’s grand opening will occur Wednesday, Aug. 17 at 6 p.m. at Hillcrest. The public is invited to attend and be among the first to try out the new playground!
- District 58 Employees Return: Principals returned to work on Monday, Aug. 1. They are very busy planning for a successful school year. In addition, New Teacher Week will take place next week. All teachers will return Aug. 25, with a kickoff event at the Tivoli Theatre in the morning.
- SAMRI Camp: District 58 partnered with Indian Prairie School District 204 to host SAMRI Camp last week at Metea Valley High School. Started by District 58 in 2014, SAMRI Camp is a free, biannual professional development opportunity for teachers. More than 350 Chicagoland teachers attended this summer’s camp, where they exchanged ideas and learned from each other.Learn more.
- Summer Book Clubs: The District hosted more than 35 Summer Book Clubs this summer in its second annual program. More than 270 students participated in the program with volunteer parent leaders. The district will host a celebration of Summer Book Club participants and volunteers on Thursday, Aug. 18.
- Math Committee Progress: The Math Committee has made great progress this summer. Math Committee grade-level teams have been meeting to refine the District’s new Math Curriculum Blueprint. The blueprint is a comprehensive and easy-to-use tool that helps teachers guide their instruction. It organizes skills and lesson plans for teachers by topic with aligned resources, essential questions, textbook correlations and more, along with a flexible timeline. The Math Curriculum Blueprint for grades K-6 is complete.
- Class Lists: The District will email parents their child’s classroom assignment after 4 p.m. on Thursday, Aug. 25. To protect the privacy of its students, the District will not publish class lists online.
- NAEP Assessment: The National Assessment of Educational Progress measures student achievement on a national level. The U.S. Department of Education annually selects random classrooms from across the United States to complete the assessment. For the 2016-17 school year, eighth grade students at Herrick and O’Neill and fourth grade students at Hillcrest will be asked to participate in this assessment. The District will share more information regarding assessment dates as it becomes available.Learn more about the NAEP.
- Annual Report: The 2016 Annual Report to the Community will be published online and mailed to everyone who resides within District 58’s boundaries in the next couple of weeks. The report captures the District’s news and achievements from last school year.
Business Report:
Assistant Superintendent for Business David Bein reported that the State recently reduced its estimate for the Corporate Personal Property Replacement Tax (CPPRT) receipts for District 58. The State has also again prorated its other funding for school districts, so all districts, including District 58, will receive a slightly lower percentage of full funding for a number of grants than last year, although the final actual funding level is not yet known. These items were taken into consideration in developing the tentative 2016-17 budget.
Separately, the District’s auditor has advised that the repayment of the State’s approximate $103,000 overpayment of the Corporate Personal Property Replacement Tax in 2015-16 should be reflected as an audit adjustment for the 2015-16 fiscal year.
The State also owes District 58 its fourth categorical payment for Fiscal Year 2016, which amounts to approximately $800,000. The District hopes to receive this payment soon.
Committee Reports:
No committees met during the past month.
Math Professional Development:
The Board approved a $48,000 contract with the Metro Chicago Math Initiative to provide teachers with additional math professional development. The Math Committee and Board of Education sought this service after receiving teacher and administrator input requesting it.
This summer, District 58’s Math Committee members (both administrators and teachers) interviewed and jointly selected Metro Chicago Math Initiative for this service. This organization will provide teachers with additional instructional best practices and mathematical depth of learning.
During the meeting, the Board also:
- Reviewed the proposed tentative budget for the 2016-17 school year, noting that both revenues and expenditures have each decreased about $200,000 since April’s Budget Workshop. This decrease is due to additional state funding cuts (highlighted in the Business Report above) and careful budgeting. The tentative budget remains generally in balance.
- Set the annual Budget Hearing for Monday, Sept. 12 at 7 p.m. at Longfellow.
- Designated these areas as hazardous for 2016-17, which makes students who reside within their boundaries eligible for fee-based transportation services, even though they live within the 1.5-mile limit. These boundaries are the same boundaries as the 2015-16 school year.
- Reviewed proposed “Spotlights on our Schools” for 2016-17.
- Approved minutes from the July 11 Regular Board Meeting.
- Approved all items on the Consent Agenda as presented in the packet materials.
- Adopted the 2016-17 Strategic Goals Action Plan.
- Set the 2016-17 student plate lunch fee at $2.60.
- Approved the Community Bank of Downers Grove as a District 58 depository.
Upcoming events:
- Monday, Aug. 22 at 6:30 p.m.: Budget Workshop at the Longfellow Center
- Monday, Sept. 12 at 7 p.m.: Regular Board Meeting and Budget Hearing at Longfellow Center
- Tuesday, Sept. 20 at 7 a.m.: Policy Committee Meeting at the ASC
District 58 Board of Education members include: John Cooper, president; Doug Purcell, vice president; Roberta Diehl; Christopher Heppner; Sallie Lupescu; John Miller; and Elizabeth Sigale, with Dr. Kari Cremascoli, superintendent; and Pam Osika, board secretary.