School district leaders discuss failed referendum

Fairfield High School Principal Art Sathoff told school board members and administrators they need to come to an agreement about the high school facility and elementary and middle school geothermal issues before asking for another public vote.

?The board needs to hash this out and come to a consensus ? not all members even wanted a vote,? Sathoff reminded the school district leaders during a work session Monday evening at the Adminstration/Curriculim/Technology Center.

School board member Ralph Messerli, who voted against having the April 6 election, has said he feels the add-on and remodel phased project plan for Fairfield High School is ?too much.? He said he thinks the current building is sufficient for teaching and learning and classrooms provide enough space. He also said he thinks the school just needs to be renovated, with that work including new electrical, plumbing and air-handling systems.

Superintendent Don Achelpohl explained the current high school does present space challenges. Today?s educators cannot stand and lecture in front of a class; they have other methods, including hands-on work, to help teach 21st Century Skills.

Board member Jennifer Anderson compared trying to use the more than 70-year-old high school to trying to use a 1980s crop planter.

?You can get the job done. You can plant, but not as efficiently,? she said.

Achelpohl added the mandate to include special education students in regular classrooms also results in more space being needed.

He also pointed out some high school classes have 24 students, which isn?t too large of a number, but a class can be limited to that size because no more students can physically fit in the room. He and Sathoff told Messerli it becomes a scheduling nightmare when they can?t get students into the classes they need when they need them.

Anderson and school board member Margaret Dwyer pointed out it would cost almost as much to renovate the building as it would to do the proposed add-on and remodel plan.

Board member Doug Flournoy summed up the board?s options as: doing nothing; piece mealing the improvements; or sticking to the original plans.

?We have good data, and we paid good money for that data,? said Anderson, who had been a member of the high school facility study committee before being elected to the school board in September. ?It?s not responsible of us to leave it as it is. It?s not responsible toward the students, and spending money on [bandage] repairs isn?t a responsible use of tax money.?

?We need to hear from voters why they voted no,? said board president Gail Miller.

For the complete article, see the Wednesday, May 5, 2010, printed edition of The Fairfield Ledger.