Below is my summary of the April 8 Collierville Schools Board meeting. This was a regular business meeting.

All of the board was in attendance. About two dozen of the public were present, as well as various Collierville Schools staff. There were no comments from the public.

After approval of the agenda, which included the removal from the agenda of the two interlocal agreements, and the approval of the minutes of the various March board meetings, the chair delivered his report.

Mr. Hansen commented on the positive results of the enrollment nights, and on the progress made towards the interlocal agreements which will allow the municipalities to band together on common services and thus have high quality services at a much lower cost than when set up individually. While the agreements weren’t ready to be voted on this week, they are nearing completion. Mr. Hansen also mentioned the Collierville Education Foundation fundraiser the board attended last week. This is a very highly commendable organization that provides grants directly to teachers. Finally, Mr Hansen touched upon the preliminary BEP funding estimate Collierville Schools got from the State Department of Education, with more detail to be provided by Mr. Aitken.

Mr Aitken, in his Superintendent’s report, addressed the BEP funding. This is the funding for the schools by the state, which is the largest part of funding for the schools. This is a set amount per enrolled student. The estimated amount, based on current enrollment numbers, was approximately $1M higher than the feasibility study had used.

Enrollment numbers from the enrollment period came out around 90-91% of the projected fall enrollment, which is, according to Mr Aitken, a very good result. The schools have continued to follow up with families who have not yet provided their intent, in order to get even more reliable enrollment projections for next year.

Mr Aitken also mentioned the new hires for Collierville Schools:

  • Director of Student Services – Herchel Burton
  • Head of nutrition – Marsha Landstreet
  • Three Powerschool administrators – Karen Dew, Becky Kenley, Tabitha Barnes
  • Director for Curriculum and Accountability, Louise Claney
  • Pre-K through 5 Supervisor, Dr Andre Crafford

These all come with significant (legacy) SCS experience.

The nutrition and powerschools positions are shared services positions, which means their expense will be spread among the participating municipal school districts, which will be covered through interlocal agreements. Mr Aitken took the time to address some concerns from the public that he had heard about the phrase ‘shared services,’ especially in regard to nutrition. The bottom line, he explained, is that each school will have staff to prepare and serve the staff and students. The cafeteria at each school will operate independently, but will have the support of the planning, administration, purchasing and budgeting processes from the central office.

With the application deadline passed for non-resident enrollment at Collierville Schools, there are approximately 700 non-resident applications to be reviewed.

Finally, Mr Aitken asked the board to authorize him to initiate an RFSOQ process for a future school to be built. This process authorizes him to review the qualifications of architecture and planning firms to help select a future site and start the planning for a new building. The need for a new school was presented to the Board of Mayor and Aldermen last week, and met with approval. The Collierville School Board voted to authorize the RFSOQ process.

The next agenda item was a report by Mr. Simpson, the consultant. He updated the board on the progress made at the historic high school building (Poplar and Walnut) for the Collierville Schools central office. The work is being overseen by the Town, and the move-in date is projected for the second week of May. Secondly, the Town has engaged Ms Debra Rike as a consultant to select a bus routing and planning software package and prepare for its use. The package under consideration is called Versatrans, which includes GPS functionality, which may offer parents the ability to see the location of the bus, and the projected time at each stop. Routing staff will be hired soon. The final part of Mr. Simpson’s update addressed work with The Pool, a Tennessee Risk Management organization that is expected to provide insurance for Collierville Schools properties and liability.

Following these updates, the Superintendent presented the proposed policies for second reading. He highlighted a few adjustments made since the last reading. Mr Vaughan motioned to suspend the rules and vote to approve the policies on the consent agenda, rather than have them return for a third reading. The motion, and the policies, were approved. A summary and some comments on these policies from the working session two weeks ago can be found here.

Finally, in closing comments, Mr. Aitken indicated that immediately following the working session in two weeks, there would be a special called meeting to vote on the interlocal agreements that were dropped from the agenda today.