Staffing woes hit home for Gilman school district

The shortage of workers in the workforce has started to impact recruiting teachers at area schools as well as across the state.

In Wisconsin alone, there were 97 positions available within the state, and there were no candidates who were willing to accept these positions. Gilman school district had to make an emergency replacement this past week due to the high school English teacher resigning the day before school started. Up until Monday, September 20, there was a substitute teacher taking that spot for the last two and a half weeks. Luckily, there has been a young woman who has stepped up and has decided to take the position. Bobbie Merrian, who has a history of being a director of education in the hospital, with a licensure to teach physical education, has accepted the position of high school English teacher. Due to the pinch that they are in, she is able to work towards getting her license while she is working at Gilman. She can get her licensure in as little as three years.

Without Merrian stepping in as teacher, the topic has been brought up to do use the “E-Succeed” virtual charter school as a way to teach the students the course. Virtual learning has raised a few eyebrows with community members. One parent brought it to the board’s attention of how a core class should not be taught virtually. She also talked with a past student, who stated the following: “I am deeply saddened of the possibility of English, a core class, being taught virtually. The skills that I learned in English, have really prepared me for the real world, for instance, communication skills, reading, writing, and creative thinking. Core classes should be taught with an in-person teacher, who can get students excited to come to class.”

In order to reach the needs of the students, the topic of a Teacher Overload Assignment was discussed amongst the board. On a semester to semester basis, the teacher in question, would not get a prep period, they would teach in place of that. The teachers who already teach two classes in one period, do not make an overload. To compensate for this, the teacher would get paid 1/7 of their contract to fulfill this request.

It was later discussed that English will continue to be taught in-person and not virtually.

School busses were a brief topic of discussion. It was concluded that the Jump River school bus route is the longest route starting at 6:30 in the morning. This is due to the loss of a bus from last year’s lineup.

The track and field track has started getting redone, with work starting on Monday. The rubberized track has been stripped of the rubber, and the pavement is being redone as well. Due to this remodel, Gilman will not host any track and field events in the 2022 season. They will host again in the spring of 2023.

An LED lighting project in the high school gymnasium and the football field, has been brought to the board’s attention. The lights that they currently have, do not have the longevity use as they were promised. To replace the non-LED lights is a huge expense for the district, with having to rent a lift for so many hours, hiring the work, and eventually getting the bulbs changed, has become more of a hassle than a help. To help control this expense, they have considered changing the lights to LED, which will save the district a lot of time and effort when it comes to lighting the field and gymnasium for sporting events. It was agreed by everyone on the board to begin this process.

Gilman and Thorp will not continue to be a co-op when it comes to the cross country team, due to lack of participation and funding. This would be the last year for the co-op. In the future, they may start the program up again as an individual school, but as of right now, the cross country team is not going to be a part of the 2023 fall sports season.

COVID-19 has started to affect the students this fall, with having seventy-one students out either because of illness, in quarantine, or children having symptoms, within the district. To help control the spread of this, it was discussed to possibly start contact tracing within 7 days with the students. This means that if a student gets sick, they will do a trace to see who the person has come in contact with, within the last week, as it has been proven to reduce the spread of the virus.

The annual meeting will be held on October 4, in the library, not the gymnasium, as it was originally published.