The West Central Valley School Board met in regular session Wednesday night.

The Board heard administrative reports, discussing how they wanted to move forward with the structure for the Activities Director position, and heard an update on the search for a high school principal from Superintendent Rusty Shockley, who told them that in the first week of the search, they had 10 applications for the position. They approved the 500 series policy review, amendment to the 2023-24 calendar, and set a public hearing for the 2024-25 school calendar for their next meeting on March 20th.

The Board then approved a 28E agreement with Adair – Casey / Guthrie Center High School to share a career technical education instructor, a student teaching agreement with Morningside University, and a bid by Sackett Concrete for $55,000 to repair the parking lot at the high school. They also approved a draft of a 28E agreement with the City of Stuart to bring Stuart Police Sergeant Katie Guisinger on as a full-time school resource officer (SRO). Guisinger tells Raccoon Valley Radio why she and the police department looked to move her to a full-time SRO position.

“Currently the school resource officer program, we’re in our fifth year, but for the last five years, it’s (been) required (that) I’ve been working on my days off to make that program a reality. So that limits the hours I’m available and how much I can grow the program. So we’re hoping to move it full-time. We’ll just allow the program to continue to grow and basically be a bigger resource to the school and the community.”

The initial draft would have the yearly salary for employing Guisinger as the SRO split between the City and the school district, where the City would cover 25 percent and the district would cover 75 percent. After some discussion, the draft was changed to have the City cover one-third, and the district cover two-thirds, which is roughly the split of time between days spent working for the district, and days spent working for the City.

The Board also approved moving forward with a project at the middle school gym, based off a quote from Baker Group for $27,632, before entering into an exempt negotiations session.