Inter-Lakes voters restore funding for technology position

MEREDITH — Questions about a plan to shift staffing within the Inter-Lakes School District dominated the annual meeting Wednesday night, with voters increasing the budget in hopes of keeping a technology position in place. A motion to add even more money to retain a math teacher failed.

Superintendent Mary Moriarty said the original goal for the technology integrator was to provide support for classroom teachers, but the district found that teachers could get the support they needed through professional training and collaborations. The current teacher, Karolbeth Glover, would be reassigned to a position that is opening up due to another teacher’s retirement.

Steve Roberts, an eighth-grade teacher at Inter-Lakes, made the motion to increase the budget by $121,130 — the amount earmarked for the technology integrator — arguing that Glover provides student-centered instruction that would be lost under the new staffing plan.

Parents and former students supported that argument, saying Glover had inspired students to focus on technology and engineering after high school, and that robotics is a way to engage youths who might otherwise struggle with their classes.

Moriarty said the new staffing plan is designed to promote science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics through an integrated course structure that includes a robotics component.

“There would be both coursework and extra-curricular opportunities, as well as woodworking, electronics, and AP computer science,” she said.

Voters passed the amendment to fund the position, 49-32.

Will it happen?

As soon as they approved the budget increase, voters were reminded that it is a “bottom-line” budget, meaning that the school district is not bound by the voter’s intentions, and can use the money in any manner it deems fit.

That led to another discussion about whether to reconsider the vote. Some voters, already upset that Inter-Lakes’ cost-per-pupil, at $22,000, is higher than the state average of $17,000 or $18,000, wanted to take back the extra money if they did not have a guarantee that it would be used as they intended.

While members of the School Board said they would listen to the superintendent’s recommendations on where best to spend the money, they also noted that they have always followed the will of the people in the past.

The vote to reconsider the previous decision failed, and discussion on the $26.55 million amended budget continued.

There was a motion to add another $98,887 to preserve a high school math teacher’s position that was to be shifted to grade 8 mathematics. Moriarty said the shift was possible, based on current enrollment projections, without impacting high school course offerings. If necessary, the district could have a computer science teacher pick up two blocks of mathematics, she said.

Some voters objected to the idea of having teachers who are not certified in their subject areas, but Moriarty said they hope to have several dual-certified teachers who are capable of teaching related subjects such as math and science. Speakers in the audience questioned the ability to find such people, but Moriarty said Inter-Lakes has a very competitive salary scale that should attract qualified candidates.

When one teacher said it would require an instructor to prepare six separate course plans, Moriarty said it would be only three for each semester.

When the amendment to add money for the math position came to a vote, it failed, 47-36.

Other questions

Voters had questions about energy savings from previous initiatives, classroom sizes, a new core reading curriculum, teacher retirement, and elementary Spanish classes.

The latter question arose from an earlier School Board decision to replace elementary Spanish with multicultural offerings. Moriarty said that, after a public hearing in which parents had advocated for keeping the program, the School Board reconsidered and put the money back in the budget to support the Spanish class.

“We’ll be meeting with the two elementary principals and talk about how to redesign but support the program,” she said.

Once the $26.55 million budget was finalized, the meeting moved quickly through the other warrant articles: placing $100,000 into the facilities maintenance expendable trust fund, $25,000 into the special education expendable trust, and creating an expendable trust fund for a multifunction school bus with an initial appropriation of $20,000.