Mt. Pleasant school board discusses topics big and small

MT. PLEASANT — The Mt. Pleasant Community School District Board of Directors discussed topics not only central to the MPCSD but to education across the state in light of current legislative conversations.

Beginning locally, Superintendent John Henriksen discussed updates pertaining to the Iowa Wesleyan property, grade-alike elementary buildings, and hiring staff.

“We’re in the process of coding all the new cylinders and keys per building,” Henriksen said of the IW property. “We’re getting that all keyed directly right now so that when the time comes, we’ll be able to give those out as needed. We’re not going to give out a master key.”

Additional happenings with the IW properties include setting up HVAC monitoring. The contract for work needed on Chapel repairs is still waiting as a contract has not yet been approved by the district attorney.

Henriksen hopes to have the Howe open by mid-April.

“It’s coming along,” Henriksen said.

According to Henriksen, not only are things coming along with the IW property, but the district continues to move forward with the grade-alike school transition.

“We just finished phase three at the end of January,” Henriksen told the board.

This means that the district knows what teachers are going to what buildings and principals are working on master schedules. Current estimations predict class sizes of 24-25 students at the elementary buildings.

Additionally, March 8 the principals will meet with their new staff during early out time. Henriksen says teachers will be given three full days on the front end of the next school year to move into their classrooms in their new buildings to get everything set.

Moving forward with grade-alike MPCSD will need to hire a new principal for Lincoln Elementary and they will conduct those interviews with the Henriksen, board member Sarah Donnolly, and a parent at Lincoln Elementary.

After updating the board about things specific to MPCD, Henriksen’s legislative took more time than usual due to many legislative issues relating specifically to education.

Following the meeting school board members Mike Hampton and Derek Mullin accompanied Henriksen to Day on the Hill where they met with legislators discussed some of the following legislation as it relates to MPCSD.

According to Henriksen, he would support the Senate File 2011 which reinstate the March 1 open enrollment deadline.

“There was always a march one deadline, and until this last year, and they said you can open the role anywhere at any time, which is has been really, really difficult to manage,” Henriksen said.

Another bit of legislation that Henriksen says the district would support is the allowing schools to start their fall calendar earlier. This legislation would allow districts to start the Tuesday or Wednesday following the State Fair.

According to Henriksen, this could impact the way that MPCSD lays out their calendar and potentially even change the duration and timing of breaks.

Henriksen was not in support of all the legislation he briefed the board on, though. While talking about legislation pertaining to State Supplemental Aid Henriksen stated proposed legislation would give the governor an indefinite amount of time to set the SSA during legislative session instead of the requirement to set it within 30 days of submitting her budget.

“It’s crazy,” Henriksen said. “It just makes things difficult because we have to have two public hearing for our certified budget coming up and we don’t even know what SSA is yet.”

SSA plays a large role in determining school district budgets as it is the amount of state funding allocated per student.

As far as the hot topic of the Area Education Agency and Senate Study Bill 3073, Henriksen, like many others in education across the state, is waiting to see what changes are made from the initial proposal by Gov. Kim Reynolds.

“There is just so much there. Everybody is working on it on both sides,” Henriksen said.

Henriksen worked together with superintendents from Danville, Mediapolis, New London, West Burlington, Burlington, Fairfield, Morning Sun, Wapello, WACO, Winfield-Mt. Union, and Columbus Junction to draft a letter to Sen. Taylor Collins expressing their opinion on the bill.

In that letter they called the original bill short-sighted and proposed the following:

“Slow down the process. A system with decades of history serving Iowa students should not be deconstructed during a 12-wek legislative session. We recommend you propose some type of study bill involving state and local education leaders (among other stakeholders) to examine what changes in the AEA system are needed. A study would focus on identifying strengths/weaknesses of the current system and develop a plan to implement the identified necessary changes. A study bull seems like a much mor prudent approach than the current process.”

The letter called putting the services of the AEA under the umbrella of the Department of Education a mistake as it would cause a loss in local control and make services “more bureaucratic and difficult to manage.”

“We, as superintendents lost trust in the DE leadership since the COVID pandemic,” the letter states. “When we needed statewide leadership to navigate the pandemic, we felt abandoned and left to figure things out on our own. Four DE Directors later, we have little confidence that putting AEA services under the DE will turn out any different.”

Comments: AnnaMarie.Ward@southeastiowaunion.com