8 GF teachers receive bonuses from state

Eight teachers in the Green Forest School District will have some extra money in the bank thanks to their efforts in helping with student achievement.

The Arkansas Department of Education recently announced the recipients of the Merit Teacher Incentive Fund Program and at its monthly meeting held Tuesday, June 22, the Green Forest school board learned that eight teachers — Kristy Youngblood, Hannah Doty, Ronda West, Lindsay Turner, Emily Smith. Rachel Brushia, Dustina Gordon and Ivy Miller — are being recognized.

With the initiation of the LEARNS Act, the Merit Teacher Incentive Fund Program was established to “recognize and reward Arkansas’s outstanding educators,” according to the Arkansas Department of Education website. “The program’s primary goals are to retain high-performing teachers in the classrooms across the state and enhance teacher recruitment and attention in priority and critical shortage areas.”

The program provides annual bonuses of “up to $10,000 across multiple categories,” according to the ADE website.

“We had four last year and three of the same teachers received it again for a second time,” Green Forest Superintendent David Gilmore said. “We are very proud of all of our teachers. They are working really hard. “

Gordon’s merit base was based on three subjects – math, literacy and science — something that’s a challenging feat for educators in the state, Gilmore said.

“You can get different amounts of merit pay based on if you moved all your kids in literacy, they give you a set amount,” he said. “If you moved your kids in literacy and math, they’d give you little bit higher amount, and if you moved them in all three areas — which doesn’t happen very often, it’s only about the top 5 percent of teachers across the state — Ms. Gordon has actually done that two years in a row now.”

Brushia will receive merit pay for two subjects for the second year in a row, Gilmore said.

“Then we had Ms. Smith who’s down as a librarian for the district, but she moved her kids in literacy, obviously working through the library and being a literacy teacher last year,” he said. “And then we have several teachers like Ms. West, who moved her kids in math, Ms. Doty that moved her kids in science, Ms. Youngblood moved her kids in math, Ms. Miller moved her kids in math and then Ms. Turner moved her kids in science.

“… We have some younger teachers that are working on and I know they’re going to get it any time now once they’ve had at least three years of experience with that.”

“He’s been at some schools where they told him he probably wouldn’t get that many wins, and he got a lot of wins out of those kids.”

McBryde will also coach the Tigers’ golf team, Gilmore said.

Also approved at the board meeting was the hiring of new assistant girls basketball coach Sarah Kulbeth, who Gilmore called “a local girl.”

“…. Green Forest is like her second home and she’s very happy to get to come home,” Gilmore said.

“… We’ve got a lot of good people bringing in a lot of energy for our programs and I think things are going to look really good for the coming school year.”

OTHER BOARD ITEMS

all students every day starting next year, so that’s something that’ll be a great help for the parents and the families,” Gilmore said.

For lunches, students who pay for meals in grades K through 5 will pay $2.25 and students in grades 6 through 12 will pay $2.40 per day, Gilmore said.

“I don’t think that’s out of line; that’s still a pretty good cost,” he said. “We couldn’t get that anywhere else, obviously.

“But, we want to make sure all of our kids have a meal no matter what. We’re going to feed them no matter what. We take care of our kids.”

The board also approved the purchase of basic school supplies for all students for the upcoming year, Gilmore said.

“Things like paper, pencils, binders, notes books, folders, things like that, we’re going to buy within the district so the parents don’t have to cover that,” he said. “The only thing parents would have to cover would be things like a backpack.”

The board also OK’d renewing a Memorandum of Understanding with the city to continue to have Green Forest School Resource Officers in the schools each day.

“We pay half of their salary and the city pays half so we have an MOU with them,” Gilmore said. “We also take on part of their cell phones and things like that so that we will have our people covered throughout the year.”

Gilmore said there will be three officers on the various campuses this coming school year.

“We will have one at K-5, one at middle school and then one at high school. That’s a pretty good amount of coverage for a school district our size,” he said. “We really like that.”

The board also approved the purchase of replacement Chromebooks for the upcoming school year, and OK’d having an auction to help the district sell items it no longer needs.

Gilmore said the plan is to hold the auction on July 19, pending weather.

The board also announced that starting Aug. 14 anyone interesting in running for the four school board seats coming up for election next year can start circulating petitions for signatures.

Early voting will begin in mid-February, with the election on March 3.

Board members up for re-election are Rodney Hayhurst of Zone 3, Jeff Boggs of Zone 4, Kenny Bonham of Zone 5 and at-large member Alechia Meador.

“We’ve got some really good board members here, but there’s still some people in town that might want to run as well, so you never know,” Gilmore said. “We just want to make sure we get people that are trying to get this district better and build it better all the time.”

“He’s got a decade of coaching experience, five of that as a head coach,” Gilmore said of McBryde. “He came to us, and was very well spoken, had a vision for the team. The schools that he’s been to, he’s kind of built those programs up. He’s very into fundamentals, making sure the kids are doing the right things at all times whether it’s on or off the court. Just a very well-spoken guy and a lot of energy. We feel like we’re happy and very fortunate to get him up here.

“Mr Compton did a very nice job for us over the years, but he decided he wanted to move in a different direction and Mr. McBryde will come in and take off where he left off.”

McBryde is originally from Northwest Arkansas, Gilmore said.

“He was around Springdale, Shiloh Christian and went to school over that way, so he’s familiar with our conference,” Gilmore said. “He really wants to get in and work hard and make a name for himself in our conference and make our kids very competitive and get as many wins as possible.

The school board approved the hiring of Ben McBryde as the new boys basketball coach for the Tigers, replacing Shane Compton.

McBryde, who most recently was the head boys coach at Sacred Heart, a private school near Morrilton, has also been a head coach at Two Rivers and an assistant coach in Mc-Donald County, Mo., and El Dorado.

He joins new head football coach Dalton Ewing, recently hired girls basketball coach Jarrett Clibrey, volleyball coach and athletic director Kristin Whetham and wrestling coach Ryan Whetham as new faces leading Green Forest High School athletic programs going into the new school year.

The board heard the district’s annual discipline report, which showed improved discipline at the high school, Gilmore said.

The board also approved a 10 percent increase in the price of lunches for students who don’t qualify for free or reduced-priced meals, the superintendent said.

“… The state will be providing breakfast for