Co-ops,

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district further ahead in the long run if numbers forced the districts to combine programs or even consolidate in the future.

“A parent brought up a good point at the parent meeting the other night — if we take Greenwood out of the equation, would we still be looking to co-op? And I would say absolutely yes, because in four years our referendum will end and I’m not sure we can get another one passed,” said Roehl.

“We need a partner. I’m looking at the big picture — where are we going to go? Looking at the big picture, we need to collaborate in education and co-op in sports. We need to try to be proactive and look down the road. We’re talking over a year in some sports (before the co-op team would start practicing); that’s a lot of time to plan. We need to take baby steps toward a common goal, working great with Greenwood, and we need to test the waters more with co-oping sports. Because if it doesn’t work, we need to find another partner.”

He said he was fine with not co-oping all sports right away, but he thought the schools needed to add at least one more sport.

“In one, two, three or four years, what if we run out of money? We have to keep moving forward, not keep hitting the brakes… Let’s work into this slowly, rather than waiting until consolidation,” he said.

Board member Holly Lindner also was inclined to move things along and not prolong staying separate. She said that Loyal should have a four-year plan to consolidate with Greenwood. But, she also felt there needed to be greater communication between coaches, parents and administration.

“We’ve had great success with the academic part. But what we’ve learned from coaches is that we’ve had major problems with the last sports co-ops we did,” she said. “We need to work with the parents and coaches to come up with a solution. After every season, we should probably have a meeting and discuss what worked and what didn’t. I think we could do one sport like girls basketball and try to find a way to help with track.”

Board member Carrie Becker also wanted the school district to work more closely with Greenwood, but wasn’t sure what the best timeline would be.

“I think we need to look into the future as well,” she said. “After the referendum, I don’t foresee this next one passing. I’m OK with consolidation; I’m OK with co-oping sports. We’ve been talking about it for a while now, we just didn’t have a timeline. I just don’t want us to end up alone without a partner.”

When Becker referred to having been in discussions about collaboration for “a while now,” she referred to the process the school districts have undergone so far that has not been as visible to the public eye as to the school board members deeply involved in it.

The school districts have been in collaboration talks for well over a year. School administrators initially discussed the issue, and soon a joint board committee consisting of members from each school board was formed that met at various times last year. However, the school boards eventually decided it would be better to have all members of both boards meet, because the joint committee members were just taking what they discussed back to their respective school boards and re-hashing the same issues.

Last September is the first time the complete school boards of both schools formally met together, at least according to agendas published on both school district websites. The September meeting was for training. The next time they met was in November, this time for a more typical meeting with agenda items.

“I’ve been part of the collaboration group since it started about a year and a half ago. I see how we complement each other and work together. We didn’t start out looking at sports, but knew it was a topic that would come up… I think we need to work as a community to discuss things, to try to put some strategic plans together – you know, to find out what the community wants as far as if we’re looking at consolidation down the road or if we want to keep our schools separate, and then build from there. And I think by making this decision now before we have all the answers, I think we would be better off to hold off,” said Odeen.

Hinkelmann said he was torn on the issue. He said he was not against cooperative sports teams or consolidation, but was not ready to make a decision yet.

Board member Derek Weyer addressed the community members gathered there and watching online, and offered a different proposal.

“I know it doesn’t sound and feel like it, but we (the board) are listening. We’re going to look at more ways to dialogue. Silence leads to assumptions that are not always accurate,” he said.

He said that talks between the two schools were not a new thing; in April 1996 the two school boards met and talked about consolidation. They did a straw poll of the community members gathered there and at that time, Greenwood said no to consolidation and Loyal said yes.

Additionally, Weyer said that the cooperative efforts that were successful had been coach-driven. He made a motion that all co-ops for athletic opportunities be reviewed by the board on an as-needed basis upon recommendation of both varsity coaches from each community of said sport. The motion failed as only Weyer and Odeen voted in favor of it.

Board member Dave Clintsman said he did not feel ready to make a decision.

“Early in the week, I was ready to try and do girls basketball. But there’s a lot of new numbers we just received in the last 24 hours. I’m not against it and I don’t wanna push this down the road to next week because I know the deadline’s Feb. 1, but there’s numbers I’d want to go over before I made that decision,” he said.

Clintsman said if he could talk to head girls basketball coach Mike Rueth and get his questions answered about the updated numbers, he didn’t see a reason why he couldn’t vote on the co-op next week. Rueth had previously said that he would be willing to sit down with board members and answer any questions they had.

“Well, I think we need to let Greenwood know what we’re doing. I don’t think it’s fair to Greenwood to leave them wondering,” said Roehl.

“Could we have Mike talk with him and have a meeting again like Monday or Tuesday?” said Becker.

She asked Rueth if that would be workable for him. He said it would be challenge, being he’s in the middle of a sports season.

“I guess my thought is, we’re back to the rushing again,” said Hinkelmann. “Would it be that bad to just tell Greenwood what we’re interested in doing? But tell them not for this year, because we need more time? Would that be so bad?”

“We can do that, but we have to let them know,” said Roehl.

“And I understand that,” said Hinkelmann. At that point, Hinkelmann made the motion listed at the beginning of this article, which passed.

“My worry is, we better explain this very well, because we could lose our partner,” said Roehl.

Other business The board approved hiring Lindsey Mueller as the new middle school/high school secretary starting full time in the 2024-25 school year. Mueller will start on a part-time basis this spring to do training with current secretary Coni Meyer. The board also approved hiring Remi Geiger as a temporary part-time special education paraprofessional and Bethany Beisner as a full-time special education paraprofessional.

The board also approved the first readings of policy IIBH – Virtual Educational/Online Learning, Policy KLBR Procedures For the Objection To Instructional/Media Materials, and Policy BDDH-E – Loyal Board of Education Meeting Public Comment Sign-In Sheet.

The school district received donations of $500 from an anonymous donor and $7,763 from the FFA Alumni to purchase a new greenhouse heater.

Chris Lindner also reported on the community survey.

Please see Co-ops, page 19 Co-ops,

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At previous joint meetings with Greenwood, it was decided that a one-question survey would be mailed to all households in the district to gauge interest in school consolidation. The administrators decided that instead of a mass mailing, they would mail out the survey information in the district newsletter, which goes to all households in the district. Loyal’s next newsletter will appear in the Feb. 7 TRG and Greenwood’s will be the week after.

The next Loyal School Board meeting is scheduled for Feb. 28 at 7 p.m.