Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
A proposed transfer of the Mountain View Elementary School property to a daycare center is proving to be more complicated than the school superintendent initially believed.
Tucumcari Public Schools superintendent Aaron McKinney said during a previous board meeting last month he was looking at transferring the school on South Rock Island Street to Eastern Plains Early Head Start, which is leasing the property for $1 a year. McKinney had said he wanted to dispose of the property because it costs the district thousands of dollars per year to maintain the building.
During the board’s most recent meeting on April 18, McKinney said he mistakenly thought the district could transfer the property to the state and avoid running afoul of the state’s anti-donation clause.
McKinney said last week it actually would be a transfer to a federal entity, not state. Such a transaction would force the district “to go through a lot of hoops,” he said, and probably would require a survey.
McKinney said Eastern Plains still wants to acquire the property and “has been interested for a long time.”
When asked by board member Jerry Lopez what an alternative might be, McKinney said one option is renegotiating the district’s contract with Eastern Plains so it would assume the building’s maintenance costs.
Mountain View Elementary School opened in the early 1950s and closed about 40 years later.
In other business:
• The board approved the second and final reading of a revised policy on public participation at board meetings.
Anyone who wishes to address the board at its meeting shall provide a request, stating the subject of the request, to be received by the superintendent on the Thursday before the Monday meeting. Such forms will be available at the unit office.
The board president will be responsible for recognizing speakers, maintaining order and keeping a time limit of 30 minutes for presentations or three minutes per speaker.
“Questions of fact asked by the public shall, when appropriate, be answered by the President referred to the Superintendent for reply,” the policy states. “No action or discussion shall transpire among Board members regarding such questions or comments.”
It also states personal attacks on board members, personnel or people in attendance “shall be discouraged” and might be subject to civil action for defamation.
Lopez previously requested changes in the policy because constituents told him it was too restrictive.
• The board approved the official calendar for the 2022-2023 school year.
Assistant superintendent Dave Johnson said faculty members voted on four options for the calendar. The one that most teachers favored includes a later start for Christmas break but an earlier end to the school year.
The first day of school would be Aug. 15. Christmas break would go from Dec. 23 to Jan. 9. Spring break would be from March 17 to March 27. The last day of instruction would be May 18, with graduation on the following day.
• Johnson said the district would offer in-person summer school at the middle and high schools and online tutoring for elementary students this summer.
Johnson said he preferred having in-person tutoring for elementary students but decided to go online because faculty have “really burned themselves out in the last two years” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I don’t want to weaken the teaching for next year,” Johnson added, noting he may use college students or retired teachers for online summer-school instruction.
Johnson said the district would use federal coronavirus relief funds to pay for summer-school instruction. He said after the meeting that 10 to 15 students typically take part in summer school.
Johnson indicated that summer school might concentrated on remedial math courses. He said Tucumcari students’ math proficiency suffered the most during the pandemic.
• The board went into a closed executive session for about an hour to discuss salaries for upper-level administrators in the 2022-2023 school year. No action was taken when open session resumed.