Wentworth School Board

Monday, April 25th, 2005
Wentworth Elementary School Minutes

Members Present: Michelle Clark, and Deborah Gelsi

Administration Present: Jeff Keene - Principal WES, Ethel Gaides – SAU 48

Also Present: NOTE: (ch) denotes: Child/Student
Debbie Parent, Vickie Lewis, Christopher Lewis, Kurt Shedrick (ch), Taylor Newberry (ch), Tamara Burrows, Lee Anderson (ch), Aimee Parent (ch), Amanda Anderson (ch), Pete Chierchetti, John Comeau, Mark Parsons, Vinnie Samson, Felix Samson, Gini Gove, Karen Fryer, Tanya O’Brien, Debbie Gossel, Palmer Koelb, Nate Koelb (ch), Angela Comeau, Aaron Comeau, Eugene Ganets (sp?), Kenyon Karl, Glen Hinckley, Mark ? , Arthur Gelsi, Tammy Coykendall, Scott Coykendall, Melody Gaudette.

 

The regular monthly meeting of the Wentworth School Board was held on Monday April 25th 2005 at 6:00 pm with Michelle Clark and Deborah Gelsi being present. Mr. Vien was absent. In Mr. Vien’s absence, Michelle Clark chaired the meeting. The agenda was approved as presented. The minutes of the March meeting were approved as presented

Study Committee Reports

• Minutes from study committees were passed to the board and reviewed. Deborah Gelsi, the chair of the Enrollment committee was unable to provide the minutes from their group as she was experiencing technical difficulties with her server and provider. She will email them to the SAU for distribution.
• Glen Hinckley asked about how the bid process works.

Principal’s Report:

• Mr. Keene updated the board on the DestiNation Imagination team. The team from Wentworth took first place at the recent regional’s and was the only team from the district to qualify. Area companies are being solicited for donations to defray team expenses. Current fundraisers are a Block Party on May 14th on the town common and a yard sale being held at the school.
• Laurie Dustin was asked to update on the fundraising, the team raised 472 dollars recently by hosting a carwash, the team has received permission from the town to use the common for the block party and in the event of inclement weather, they are permitted to use the “Town Hall”.
• Michelle Clark asked about chaperones and was assured that all chaperones have had background checks completed and that two of the chaperones are parents of team members. Mr. Keene designates Laurie Melanson as his duly authorized representative for the trip.
• Motion was made by Michelle Clark and seconded by Deborah Gelsi to allow the team to go to Knoxville to compete and the motion passed unanimously.
• The Board offered their congratulations to the team and school.

Policy Requests

The following issues were discussed briefly as to developing written policies to be reviewed and voted on at an upcoming meeting. The SAU will have policy examples from the NHSBA available at the next meeting.

• Student Fundraising
• Field Trip and Excursions
• Travel and/or Expense Reimbursement
• Code of Conduct/Professional Ethics
• Homework/Attendance Policy Review
• Drug/Alcohol

Recognition/Awards

• Mr. Keene would like to recognize Deborah Gelsi for the Wentworth Talk of the Towns in the local paper and for continuing to promote the school and students and activities in the local media.
• Mr. Keene recognizes all of the hard work and effort that Scott Coykendall and his students have done to prepare boilerplate language for grant writing. The Playground recently received a grant thanks in large part to Scott’s assistance.
• Recognition to Bill Melanson (asst coach) and Kevin Patton (Coach) for the baseball hats.
• Recognition to Melody Gaudette being elected President of the PTO and for her persistent efforts on behalf of the children of WES, including the science kits, the playground, etc.
• Mrs. Fryer would like to recognize Melody for all of the hard work she did for the bake sales to raise money for the Fisher Cats Educational Day.

Privilege of the Floor

Ski Program

• Mr. Keene would like the board to review and discuss the merits of continuing or discontinuing the Winter Ski Program. The school had a 50% participation rate and currently the expense and participation or lack thereof is being reviewed by other boards within the district. Mr. Keene commented that there are good merits to the program but the cost for some families is a hardship and even with the PTO scholarships, some families are finding the cost unmanageable or not affordable.
• Several parents commented and stated that the program was a valuable one and should not be removed, while other parents who have several children in the school, commented that financially the program isn’t affordable to their children.
• Michelle mentioned an alternative program and a future discussion of classroom hours as compared to instructional hours. She suggests a workshop of the board to determine future viability of the program
• Frances Muzzey asked if the goals and objectives had been determined and is it athletic driven.
• There was added concern from some parents about travel time.

Read-A-Thon

• Angela Comeau commented that the ReadAThon is still underway and ends May 27th.

School Bus Policy

• Christopher Lewis, Vickie Lewis and Tamara Burros, all of South Wentworth, complained to the board that on Monday afternoon (April 25th) their children were expelled or forced from the school bus and were between 1 mile and 4 miles from home (3 children were 1.5 miles from home, the other 2 were 4 miles from home). Two of the children were 10 years old and were expelled by the driver at which time the older siblings of these students voluntarily got off the bus to accompany their younger brother and sister. There was no bus monitor on the bus that afternoon. Mr. Lewis made a statement that he would like to discuss this with the bus driver himself on Tuesday April 26th. Deborah Gelsi asked that Mr. Lewis refrain from approaching the driver until the board and Principal Keene can investigate and determine what happened. Mrs. Gelsi promised to call both the Lewis Family and the Burros Family with an update on Tuesday.
• Tamara Burros indicated that this is not the first episode of conflict with this driver and that he has on several occasions exhibited tendencies of violent behavior toward her children and others. She requests immediate alternate transportation while this driver is operating a town bus.
• Ethel indicated to the board that this particular driver would not be driving the Wentworth bus after Friday April 29th.
• When questioned, the children indicated that having a monitor on the bus makes no difference as the monitor has a tendency to sleep most of the trip.
• Mr. Keene, School Board and SAU to investigate claims immediately and coordinate effort to resolve.

Other

• Several attendees commented that they had heard that there was a member of the support staff that was not going to be renewed and they wished to advise the board that they are very against this and would like to see this person renewed.
• Deborah Gelsi asked how they had knowledge of matters that had been discussed in a Non Public Session. – All stated that the support staff employee had told them. Mrs. Gelsi then commented her concern was where the information came from and that she was satisfied that the information did not come from a member of the board or the SAU (not permissible) and had instead come from the staff member (permissible).

Non-Public Session.

Non Public (RSA 91-A: 3)
Exclusive allowable purposes are: personnel issues, nominations and hiring, reputation, sale or acquisition of property, litigation, 91-A: 2 (non meetings) consultant with legal counsel or negotiations, 91-A: 5 student records or information deemed confidential, personal or invasion of privacy.

Michelle Clark moved to go into Non Public Session at 7:15 pm

Return from Non Public:

Michelle Clark made a motion to return from Non Public at 9:25 pm

Nominations/Personnel

• On behalf of the Superintendent, Ethel Gaides nominates the full slate of support staff as presented.

Michelle Clark, motion to accept.
Deborah Gelsi, motion to second
Motion passes 2-0 in favor.

Michelle Clark announced that she has placed her house for sale with a real estate company and expects to continue in her role as School Board member until the sale of her house is completed.

Motion to adjourn at 9:36 pm.

The next scheduled meeting of the Wentworth School Board is May 16th 2005 at 6pm at the Wentworth Elementary School.

Respectfully submitted:

Deborah Gelsi
School Board Member and Secretary.