At their Monday night meeting, the Montezuma-Cortez District Accountability Committee discussed a variety of topics relating to the budget, strategic plan and more.
On this month’s agenda, the DAC covered midyear budget updates, the strategic plan, updated goals and Southwest Open School’s charter application review, among other items not on the agenda.
During the midyear budget update, executive director of finance Danielle Brafford told the DAC that the district is on track for expenditures.
Brafford also responded to a question about the amount allocated for safety, which covers salaries for safety staff and school resource officer, training and some of the detectors.
When a DAC member inquired about the funds that covered the fence surrounding the high school, Brafford said that fence was fully funded by grant money.
Brafford added that the ongoing legal issues with HVAC systems and election initiatives to promote the mill levy vote had caused some increases in expenditures.
After Brafford’s report, the DAC discussed programs or ways to motivate students who have been identified as “quiet refusal” or apathetic students who aren’t doing their work. They also discussed how to “make homeroom more meaningful,” noting that homeroom time hasn’t been consistent and students aren’t enjoying it.
One member suggested that homeroom could be a time where students build connections with each other and develop a sense of family with their fellow students, saying students could have specific topics to talk about each day or participate in some other activity.
The DAC also went over the district’s strategic plan, noting that the staff wellness ideas listed in the plan haven’t been carried out or have fizzled out in the three or four years since the plan was developed.
One of the members shared that the most effective way to carry out some of the initiatives in the strategic plan is to have a committee or volunteers who can put those ideas into effect, but there are not enough volunteers at this time to make that possible.
Exit interviews were also discussed, with the committee expressing their desire for exit interviews to be made available to principals and DAC members so trends of why people leave the district can be analyzed.
Jim Parr, executive director of student academic services, said he believed they would review the strategic plan next week.
The committee said they would like to hear from the people in the district working on the strategic plan to see what needs more work and what is on track.
Toward the end of the meeting, one of the DAC members, who is a teacher, said teachers are now being asked to clock in when they arrive at school and when they leave, something he said he had never done before during his time as a teacher.
The DAC wondered about this new rule, asking why salary or contract staff would be asked to clock in. This discussion led to the DAC expressing their thoughts on the four-day versus five-day work week, noting that one of the reasons the four-day work week was put into effect was due to teacher retention.
Another DAC teacher member shared that the teachers’ summers could be cut short without summer school, only allowing them three weeks off rather than the usual two months.
In light of this news, she shared that she would rather work a five-day workweek and receive a full summer rather than have to return to work early on in the summer.
The next DAC meeting will take place on Monday, Jan. 13 at 5:30 p.m.
