Medford school board approves new pool scoreboard

A new scoreboard will be coming for the Medford Area Senior High School pool area.

Members of the Medford School Board on Monday approved contributing $15,000 of school funds to the project, matching $14,500 which had already been pledged by the Aquafins group for a scoreboard replacement and other upgrades to the pool and its timing equipment.

Aquafins president Oralee Dittrich said the organization has pledged $14,500 so far to the project and that fundraising letters had been sent out late last week for the project.

She explained that the current timing system which uses large televisions to display results is simply not working. In the current system, results from the timing equipment go into a dedicated laptop which feeds into the monitors. According to aquatic and fitness center director Mandy Haenel one of the monitors is currently working only because a cable is connected and strung over the pool to the laptop. She said that in a recent meet another television had to be rolled into the pool taking up deck space.

“When it comes to running an entire day meet, for our tech to not be working it is frustrating,” Dittrich said. There are currently 56 youth in the Aquafins Club with the oldest age 15.

The proposal called for the replacement of the display to one that specifically works with the Colorado Time Systems and will display the lane, place and time for the races. The cost for the new board is $20,860.

Aquafins came to the board seeking their support for the project, noting that with plans to redo the deck area this spring, it would also be a good time to address issues with the starting blocks and to replace some of the touchpads that are no longer working as part of the timing equipment.

“You can’t run a meet without a timing system,” Dittrich said.

Dittrich said the total they are looking to raise is $30,000 to make the needed improvements. By coming to the district now, they hoped to be able to move forward with ordering the new display board so that it was in place for when the girls swimming season starts noting it usually takes approximately six months for this type of equipment to arrive.

Initially the group was only seeking school district help with the scoreboard portion, however board member Brian Hallgren noted there were other needs and that the school should be supporting the swim program. “What do you need to cover this other stuff?” Hallgren asked, before making the motion to contribute $15,000 to the project.

Because the timing equipment will be used by the community and the middle school swim teams in addition to the high school teams, a portion of the project qualifies to come out of the Fund 80 community service fund as opposed from all coming out of Fund 10 which is for educational programs.

According to school finance director Audra Brooks, about 40% will come from Fund 80 with the remainder from Fund 10.

District administrator Pat Sullivan said the plan would be to order the equipment the next day after approval.

Bullying report

Board members received their twice-yearly report on potential bullying in the schools in the district and steps being done to address bullying.

Shelley Crank-Woller reported there were no bullying reports at the elementary level so far this year.

She explained that they track office discipline referrals (ODRs) and other student discipline metrics throughout the year and that the elementary school is on track for their goals in low numbers of office discipline referrals. The district’s goal was to stay around the 75th percentile nationally on ODRs, but that they are hovering currently around the 50th percentile.

She said they also track the number, severity and type of ODR and noted that 96% of them fell on the lowest ranking of the spectrum.

At the middle school, assistant principal Jodi Butler, reported there has been one harassment report that was turned in by a parent. School staff followed the process of addressing the issues with the students and has since continued to do check ins with the students. “The incident has resolved itself,” Butler said.

She noted that they are in the beginning steps of reports and investigating into a bullying concern raised on Monday.

MASH assistant principal Andy Guden said there have been two reported at the high school which included reports and investigation. Guden praised the process for including follow up for both the bully and the victims.

He said they want the students to learn from and not to do it again.

Sullivan said that one of the major issues with bullying is to have students come forward and report it. He said one of the challenges is in the definition of bullying which is based on repeated incidents. He said a one time incident doesn’t meet that definition.

He also said social media outside the school day is also a big part of what is going on. “How do you get kids to report it?” Sullivan asked, noting students cite concerns over potential retaliation.

Board member Jodi Nernberger said she was pleased to see conflict resolution taking place involving the families of both sides.

“Hurting people, hurt people,” said board member Don Everhard, noting that often students who show bullying type of behaviors do so because they are dealing with other issues.

Wrestling room

The school district brought what had been projected to be a $47,000 clean-up project to under $15,000.

Following up on a staff member concern, mold was discovered in the wrestling room located in the lower level of the high school. The room was closed and the district’s insurance was contacted as well as a company that deals with mold clean up.

According to Sullivan, the quote for the clean up was $47,000 on top of the need to purchase a new wrestling mat. The district’s insurance was willing to pay $15,000.

Sullivan said facilities manager Adam Schwarz looked into it and consulted with experts who deal with mold clean up and determined it could be done in-house. Sullivan said there was a call for volunteers willing to take part in the clean-up efforts and said he was among those who helped out and did the work while wearing masks and protective gear. He said everyone was masked and had signed waivers and that no one was forced to assist.

He said they were able to get the mold cleaned up and ended up removing the bottom layer of mats in there, noting that this summer a new mat will need to be purchased and added to the room to provide more cushion.

In addition a plastic layer was put under the mats in order to improve airflow and a sump pump in the corner of the room was sealed better.

Sullivan said the wrestlers were able to return using the room over Christmas break. The labor and material costs so far have been about $11,000, with the cost of replacing one of the mats still to come.

In other business, board members:

 Approved a change to the Rural Virtual Academy non-administrative staff contracts reducing their contract days from 220 to 210 to bring it closer to alignment with teachers in the brick and mortar school building who have 179.5 contract days. According to Sullivan, starting teachers in the RVA and traditional school are paid the same rate. The RVA is chartered as a year-round school and according to RVA administrator Charlie Heckel, teachers are in front of kids 200 days a year in the RVA and this would remain unchanged with the proposed reduction. What would be reduced is discretional work days. “It would not impact the instructional time for kids,” he said.

The change was brought forward now as the RVA continues to grow and have improved efficiencies.

 Received their first view of the preliminary budget for the 2024-2025 school year. The budget right now calls for a drop of nearly $2 million in spending between the current school year and next year as the high school office addition project will be completed and the building trade’s house building will hopefully be self-sustaining going forward with the sale of one house used to fund the following year. Brooks noted that next year’s budget also includes about $2 million less in federal aids with the ESSER funds being spent down.

 Approved allowing Brooks to enter into a negotiated five-year contract for copy and print management services with Bauernfeind Business Technologies for maintenance and upkeep of the district’s copiers and printers. Brooks had sought permission to negotiate a new contract directly for the professional service rather than going through the request for proposal process with other vendors. Sullivan noted the district is happy with the service they have gotten from Bauernfeind in the past. The district pays about $57,000 for the services of the company which includes 4.6 million black and white copies and 675,000 color copies printed each year. Brooks noted that Bauernfeind had already agreed to at least the amount in a recent state bid that was lower than what the district had been paying.

 Received a report from those attending the Wisconsin Association of School Boards convention held in Milwaukee last week. Board members attended sessions on searching for a new administrator, school finance, student transportation, and on strategies to reduce vaping.

 Approved the second reading of routine policy reviews for policies regarding waste management, student transportation, materials resource management, use of school equipment for students/staff, management of hazardous substance and school wellness.

 Adjusted the policy change to allow up to 2,300 students in the RVA, an increase of 100 students from last year.

“Hurting people, hurt people,” — School board member Don Everhard about the causes of bullying behavior in schools.