Kutztown School Board approved the transfer of High School Principal Rebecca Beidelman to a classroom teaching position giving her the chance to ‘practice what she preaches,’ as she described.
Beidelman will be a middle school social studies teacher for the coming school year.
Superintendent Katherine Metrick reports that the administration is preparing for interviews for the high school principal position as well as moving forward with interviews for support staff and teacher positions.
In addition to Beidelman’s transfer, the board on Monday night appointed David Miller as Business Administrator effective July 1and Dr. Diane Barrie as Curriculum Coordinator effective July 29.
The board approved hiring Richard Hadley as a middle schoolGerman teacher, Jade Rauch as a kindergarten teacher at Greenwich-Lenhartsville Elementary, Melissa Farina as a long-term substitute high school biology teacher for the first semester and Nicole Gonzalez as a long-term second grade substitute teacher at Kutztown Elementary for the 2013-14, all effective Aug. 19.The board also approved Kelly Fly as a part-time office aid at Greenwich-Lenhartsville Elementary, effective Aug. 26.
Other actions included the purchase of a cafeteria pressure steamer and stationary kettle, as well as the quote from Adams Chemical Service Inc. for chiller and boiler water treatment services for July 1, 2013 through June 30, 2014.Consolidated Engineers were approved as the engineer for the project to replace the boilers and domestic water heaters at Kutztown Middle School.
The board accepted a proposal from Schatz Engineering Inc. to replace the tennis court lighting control enclosure and components with a new enclosure, distribution panel and control panel.
Monday night also served as the first reading of two proposed policies. Policy 119.1 regarding controversial issues requires that such issues be approached from an informative basis while withholding personal opinion to allow students to reach their own conclusions. Policy 818 applies the mandatory criminal history and child abuse background check policy to any independent contractors and their employees who may have direct contact with children, as well as requiring such employees to undergo training to recognize and report child abuse.
Following a board discussion, a number of out-of-lease district laptops will be sold to Sycamore International at the recommendation of the Policy and Curriculum Committee. Under the agreement Sycamore is responsible for wiping the software and other files according to Department of Defense standards for refurbishment or disposal.
Board member Patricia Bealer raised the question about re-purposing the laptops for other uses or re-configuring them for sale to the public but the time and software needed to wipe the computers and reinstall an operating system and basic application software was considered prohibitive. Many of the laptops were supplied through the now-defunct Classrooms for the Future grant. Once the terms of the lease are up, the school would have to remove the existing CFF software and purchase new software in order to continue using the computers. The sale is expected to net about $50,000.
