by K. G. Beavers, Messenger Staff Writer
The Franklin County school board met in a regular session on Oct. 8. Discussion included the renovation bids for Sewanee Elementary School and a district Race to the Top grant application.
After discussing a number of alternatives about the SES renovation, the board decided to remove the water-harvesting system from the bid and rebid the project with a metal roof. New bids will be ready by the work session on Nov. 5. “We are interested in the metal roof, and the rain water harvester is not cost-efficient,” said Chris McDonough, school board member.
“We all agree we must repair Sewanee Elementary. Since we are displacing water from a county property to property on the Domain, we need to talk with the Domain manager and make sure what we are doing is correct,” he said.
“In light of the large-scale construction project going on at the Sewanee golf course and what happened with water runoff into Shakerag Hollow, we need to have that conversation with the Domain manager,” said McDonough.
The plans for the water runoff at SES is to have the water discharged slowly back into the natural water table on the playground side of the building. The rest of the water runoff will be taken underground to the back part of the site towards the creek.
The school board budget will have to be amended by moving money from the fund balance to a budget line item. The county commission will also have to approve the money being moved from the fund balance.
In another matter, Director of Schools Rebecca Sharber reported that the school system is in the process of applying for a district Race to the Top grant from the U.S. Department of Education. Even if the Franklin County system does not receive the grant, she said, the process of writing the proposal has been helpful for long-range planning goals.
“This grant is a long shot, but we have to try,” said Sharber.
In the grant application, Franklin County has three goals. One is to hire and train teachers to be a professional learning community. With the grant money, Franklin County would build a science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) community center. The third goal would be to extend the reach of the best Franklin County teachers to the STEM center. The grant proposal is due at the end of this month and will be awarded in December to between 15 and 25 school districts.
The Department of Education expects to make four-year awards ranging from $5 million to $40 million to those districts “that have the leadership and vision to implement the strategies, structures and systems needed to implement personalized, student-focused approaches to learning and teaching that will produce excellence and ensure equity for all students.”
For more information, go to <http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop-district/index.html>.
In order to help the long range planning with the county commission and county departments, Richard Stewart, the mayor of Franklin County, has appointed a commissioner to each of the departments. This was done to help the commissioners better understand the departments’ budgetary processes. Commissioner Sherwood Ebey has been assigned to the school board.
No comments:
Post a Comment