The following is Superintendent's Message to Employees of the Kuna School District for the week of April 13th. Superintendent's Messages are sent to employees on Wednesday of each week, and include the following sections: Celebrations, Upcoming Events, Budget Updates, and Rumor Mill.
Celebrations
Congratulations to a Stellar Special Education Team at KHS
Alison Barber from the Kuna High School Special Education Resource Room recently used her Medicaid funds to purchase digital cameras for all the ERR teachers in the district to help with IAA documentation. We appreciate Alison's willingness to improve the educational opportunities for all our District's students.
Nancy Gray, Kuna High School Special Education Resource Room Language Arts, presented a paper at this year’s American Educational Research Association Conference. AERA received more than 11,000 proposals this year and a limited number were selected for presentation. The paper, entitled "The Role of School Leaders in Teacher-Peer Social Relationships: A Critical Collective Case Study" was presented April 13th, 2009 in San Diego, CA. Nancy co-authored the paper with Dr. Mary Gardiner of the University of Idaho. The paper is based on Nancy’s dissertation. She will defend her dissertation later this April and receive her PhD degree in May, 2009.
KSD Extends Thanks to Study Circles Facilitators and Student Volunteers
District administration would like to thank all of those individuals who volunteered their time to facilitate and support the Community Study Circles session that was held last week. The following individuals provided invaluable support: Sherrie Feist, Royleen Anderson, Brenda Blitman, Wilma Thornton, Zella Johnson, Lora Seabaugh, Karen Hammond, Ken LilienKamp, Susan Crew, Jennifer Wright, Anita Edwards, Arnette Johnson and Sharee Adkins. Student volunteers were also greatly appreciated.
Upcoming Events
School Board to Hold Special Open Session on Saturday, April 18th
The Kuna School Board of Trustees will meet in a special open session at 8:00 a.m. on Saturday, April 18th in the KHS Library. The Board of Trustees is holding this special session to discuss budget options, including the possibility of a supplemental levy. The public is welcome to attend this special session.
Budget Updates
Superintendent Presents Recommended 2009-2010 Budget Options to School Board
Superintendent Hummel and other District administrators presented an array of information to the School Board of Trustees during last night's regular session. With about 30 employees and patrons in attendance, Hummel provided the four members of the Board in attendance with a synopsis of the information presented at last week's Study Circles sessions. "It has been a long and challenging road from where we started at the beginning of 2009," comments Hummel. "Since our initial anticipation that we would be operating with reduced revenue, we have worked hard as a community to come together and understand what we are faced with. From February's Employee, Student, and Community Forums to the diligent weekly work of the Budget Review Team and last week's resulting Employee, Student, and Community Study Circles, we have most definitely come a very long way together."
Superintendent Hummel presented a number of options to the Board of Trustees and ultimately recommended the following option:
- Ask patrons for a $1.1 million supplemental tax levy;
- Maintain the current number of teachers and current teacher pay;
- Reduce expenses in areas of administration, supervisors, and classified employees by reducing positions through attrition, reassignment, and/or federal stimulus money; and
- Transition to a full-day, every-other-day Kindergarten.
After discussing Hummel's recommendation, the School Board opted to schedule a special open session at 8:00 a.m. on Saturday, April 18th so that all Board members could be present to cast their votes on this very important issue. Each of the documents presented to the Board of Trustees during this discussion have been included with this message and we invite you to familiarize yourself with the District's available options. If you wish to express your opinions or concerns to our Board of Trustees, you can do so by submitting feedback through the District's news site (http://www.kunaschools.org/component/rsform/form/3-submit-form-rumors-questions-feedback.html).
Rumor Mill
Have You Heard a Rumor and Want to Know the Answer? E-mail KSD News!
It is easy for rumors to get started in light of all the questions and concerns employees and parents have regarding the future of the Kuna School District. If you've heard a rumor that you'd like to get an "official" response on, we encourage you to e-mail the rumor to
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. You can also visit http://www.kunaschools.org/component/rsform/form/3-submit-form-rumors-questions-feedback.html.
Rumor: I have heard from our substitutes that certified teacher subs are used first and then other substitutes, whether or not someone else has been requested.
To the best of our knowledge, sub requests are filled first and foremost according to a teacher's request. If a teacher requests a specific substitute, the District's sub coordinator works very hard to fulfill that request. In the event that a specifically requested individual is not available to substitute for a teacher, our sub coordinator will attempt to provide a substitute who has qualifications that best suit the responsibilities. Often times, this means filling a sub request with an individual who is certified to teach. We ask that teachers experiencing anything to the contrary discuss their concerns with their Building Administrator or Principal.