Berryville board approves purchase of student supplies

The Berryville School District is once again footing the bill for school supplies for all of its students.

At its regular monthly meeting on July 17, the school board voted to approve the expenditure, continuing the trend for school districts in the county.

“We’ve done it for a number of years,” superintendent Owen Powell said. “It’s a good thing for our families. Plus, we try to buy all of our school supplies locally to help out the community and the whole town.”

Powell said principals at each campus make a list of supplies needed and the approximate cost of those items. The board approved approximately $15,000 in supply purchases for the elementary school, approximately $16,000 for the intermediate school, $12,000 for the middle school and $8,000 for the high school.

“We used to send out lists of items that students would need for the school year,” Powell said. “We’d send them to parents and those parents would have to go to the stores and buy all of those supplies. Now, the principals come up with lists based on the number of students that they will have in the their building.”

Taking care of the annual purchase is something the district gets accolades on, Powell said.

“We normally get quite a bit of positive feedback on it,” he said. “I know our parents are very appreciative of it and I’m glad that we can do it and help our parents.”

In other action, the school board approved a purchase of $22,000 for fuel for district vehicles and a contract for a new phone system for all buildings in the district.

“Our phone system we have in the district is over 10 years old,” Powell said. “Anything in technology, if it’s over 3 to 5 years old, it’s a dinosaur. So, we’re upgrading our phone system throughout the district.”

Another approval was the district’s property insurance renewal, which went up from approximately $120,000 a year to more than $300,000 a year, Powell said.

“It’s hitting school districts really hard,” Powell said of the insurance rate hike. “And it’s not just Berryville; it’s every school in the state.

“I don’t think it’s official yet, but I know that there was some word through the state department (of education) that they were going to try to help school districts out with the increases. If that should pass through legislation, I believe we would get $60,000 to help us offset that increase.”

The board also heard an update on facility improvements, and Powell said everything is on schedule as the new school year approaches.

“We’re on track to have everything ready to go for the students,” he said. “The demolition [of the former elementary building] is gong well. We won’t be completely finished with that by the start of the school year, but we will hopefully be to the point where we’ll have all the heavy equipment gone and out of there.

“That’s our goal. Safety is number one out there.”

Teachers return to campuses on Monday, Aug. 7 and the first day for students is Monday, Aug. 14.

In personnel approvals, the board OK’d the hires of Suzanne Wilburn as elementary art teacher, Mallory Watkins and an intermediate teacher, Cecilia Doss as a middle school teacher, Larissa Laguna as an ESL teacher, Cole Moix as middle school/ high school choir director, Jamie Casey as high school administrative assistant, Karla Brown-Tesch as paraprofessional, Hilary Parks as paraprofessional distance learning lab and Shonna Coleman, Robin Poyner and Tabitha Estilette as cafeteria substitutes.

Approved transfers included Rachel Frank from middle school ESL to elementary ESL, Rachel Beckwith from a purchase service speech therapist to a district speech pathologist and Henry Adams, Auston Crow and James Boatright from bus driver substitutes to bus route drivers.