By Tracy Ouellette
SLN Staff
East Troy Community School District Administrator Chris Hibner announced there will be one seat on the School Board up for election in 2017. The seat is held by Steve Lambrechts.
The spring election will be April 4, 2017. Should more than two candidates run for the open seat, a primary election will be held on Feb. 21, 2017.
Nomination papers will be available at the School District office, 2043 Division St., on Dec. 1. For more information, contact Administrative Assistant Terry Carstens at (262) 642-6710, ext. 1221.
Forensics returning
After eliminating the forensics club at the high school a year ago, the district is bringing the program because of high demand.
“When we stopped the program we were down to about six kids and it made fiscal sense at the time,” Business Manager Kathy Zwirgzdas said Tuesday morning. “But there’s been so much interest this year and we have about 30 kids who want to participate, we’re starting it back up.”
High School English teacher Claudia Felske will be leading the new forensics club with the help of some new volunteers.
“We’re treating it an entry-level club this year,” Zwirgzdas told the School Board Monday night. “It’s not going to be at the level it was say 3 or 4 years ago, but we’re looking at it as a trial year to see how things go.”
To help with bringing the club back, the East Troy Education Foundation has donated $1,000 for the club.
School Board member Martha Bresler said she was “thrilled” when she heard about the volunteers stepping up to bring forensics back to the district, citing the time commitment and travel expenses as past issues. She said it was her hope that with more volunteers, duties could be spread out more and there would be less “burn out.”
Busing the kids
Zwirgzdas told the board she was looking into the possible savings and/or advantages of contracting bus service out of the district. East Troy Schools are one of the few districts in the area that has its own bus service for the district children.
Zwirgzdas said she usually looks into the issue every few years to see if there is a better way to transport the kids and to be a good steward of taxpayer money.
She said the district sent out about 10 requests for proposal to different transportation services in the area and had received two back. She and her staff were in the process of reviewing the proposals to see if there was a “better way to do things.”
Zwirgzdas told the board she might be bringing the issue to the December board meeting, if the examination of the proposals showed and advantage to outsourcing.
Applying for the Magna Award
Hibner told the board the district had applied for the Magna Award for its personalized learning policy.
He said they were encouraged by the response they had gotten from Ryan Krohn, of the Institute of Personalized Learning, when he toured the district. Krohn wrote a letter to Hibner after his visit commending East Troy Schools on its policy and personalized learning efforts.
