Security discussed by Hill City school board

By: 
Leslie Silverman

Building security was the focus at the most recent Hill City School District Board of Education meeting.

The matter was addressed by Marcus Isakson, school resource officer.

“When we walk by an exterior door here it’s motion sensored to unlock the door for you, instead of an emergency push out bar,” he said. “So if somebody knew there was a really bad person trying to get into our school and we locked down, if a kid or staff runs by a door the door unlocks.”

The doors with the fobs work on a magnet system and school district superintendent Blake Gardner will reach out to Golden West and maintenance director Jeff Anderson to rectify the issue.

The second security issue Isakson notes is access from the fitness center to the middle school.

“The way the doors are set up to the running track if we want access to the running track it kind of opens up the whole school,” he said. “During (the time) fitness center people have acces they pretty much have access to the entire middle school.”

High school and middle school principal Todd Satter agrees with the assessment.

“I think his main concern is that some days we have people in the fitness center working out that have full access to the middle school,” Satter said. “We don’t vet anybody that goes in there. There’re no background checks. We kicked the public library out seven or eight years ago because people were coming and using it that we didn’t know and we felt it was in the students best interest that we stop doing that. We’re doing it again and all it would mean is closing the track doors.”

The board asked the administration to bring a recommendation to address this issue. 

Food service director Roxann Dubois discussed  some families falling behind on paying for school lunches and are also not accepting help from the Angel Fund.

“One of the things that I’m coming up against is that I have three families that for whatever reason have decided not to turn in an application after numerous times of being given an application and finally it’s come down to ‘here’s your balance. I’m sorry,’” Dubois said. “I don’t know what else to do.”

Board member Angie Ross aired concerns about families “falling too far under” and not being able to then get back up. Dubois asked the board for help in coming up with a solution.

“I think as a school board I’m turning this over to you and saying ‘what do you want to do with this?’” DuBois said. “The way that the Angel fund is is set up it would not be fair to fix this problem for them.”

Dubois siad that if it is only two families, there is money available to help them and that this is a problem that occurred last year, as well. She will reach out to other districts to see how they handle situations of this nature.

The fencing on the football field is still not finished according to Anderson.

“The football field, there hasn’t been a lot of action out there,” Anderson said. “It was supposed to be done last week and I haven’t seen them. We got about half done.” 

Anderson would like the project finished as soon as possible to turn the water off and winterize the facilities.

“July 10 is when we reached out to them to begin the project,” Gardner said. “But then we had a hard time getting a hold of him. He does a little bit of work and then he disappears for a while. Not we’re getting to the point in the season that he better get going.”

Forest Service guidelines prevent work from taking  place during the Osprey breeding season. There is nothing in the contract concerning a timeline or completion of the project.

In Hill City School District “good news,” the district was the recipient of the Values Driving Institution of Excellence award by AdvancED Engagement Review.

“In our 11 state region we were recognized as the values driven awards winner,” Gardner said. “They kept saying we felt like a family. There’s a positive culture.”

The board also took time to recognize the efforts of the girl’s cross country team. The girls went to the state meet and “ran their hearts out” and came in second place by 30 points, according to coach Jared Noyes.

A total of 12.2 percent of the student population in the district are receiving special education services according to Toni Brun, special education director. This is below the state and national average.

The board approved the hiring of a December college graduate to add an additional special education teacher to the district. 

Satter shared the ACT data for the past four years, which he described as “just short of amazing.”

The scores show Hill City School District is performing above the state average and in 2019 had the top scores in the region. He also talked about live streaming sporting events so that more people can watch the events from home.

The elementary school will have an after school activity science, technology, engineering and mathematics academy that will utilize the makerspace classroom and also feature hands-on robots.

The board approved a three-year banner sponsorship by First Interstate Bank.

Coaching contracts for Jared Noyes and Brady Chase were approved.

The board chose to table a request by the county auditor to use facilities for the 2020 election. Concern about election dates conflicting with activities and school security prevented the board from voting on this. The board has until April 15 to make a decision.

The board did approve the use of facilities for the Black Hills Film Festival, which takes place on Feb. 22-23.

Carmen Ronish was appointed to the wellness committee.

The audit of the school district has been completed and will be reported on at the next school board meeting.

Discussion about changing the structure of parentteacher conferences took place.

Satter brought up the possibility of eliminating conferences at the high school and middle school levels in exchange for going to school an extra day. Discussion focused on lack of attendance at these grade levels.

In addition, Satter proposed whether the use of Infinite Campus and other technologies make conferences obsolete. This is a negotiated item and Satter will find out what other nearby schools are doing.

The board reviewed the foundations and basic commitments policy. Ten percent of the policy addresses wellness.

Gardner discussed the possibility of changing wording to include the Every Child Succeeds Act. No action was taken on this matter.

The next Hill City School Board meeting is Dec. 9.

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