Beech Tree News Network

The Butler County Board of Education met in a lengthy regular session meeting Tuesday night at Butler County Middle School.  Board member Charles Price was absent.
 
Detailed assessment reports were presented on two schools.  Principal Pat O’Driscoll gave a presentation on Butler County High School’s Assessment, Improvement Plan, and GAP Report.  BCHS is classified as Proficient.  Assistant Principal Chad Flener gave a presentation on Morgantown Elementary School’s Assessment, Impovement Plan, and GAP Report; MES is classified as Needs Improvement/Progressing.  Both reports detailed the progress each school is making and where improvement needs to be made.  Superintendent Scott Howard praised what he called a “complete paradigm shift” away from old managerial approaches in the school system over the last five years.
 
Funding levels from outside sources was a topic touched upon frequently.  Latisha Cardwell spoke to the Board about the KEA/BCEA’s Raise Your Hands initiative for public funding of education in Kentucky; Cardwell spoke on communicating beyond statistics when addressing legislators and relating personal stories on the impact of funding reductions.  Superintendent Howard mentioned that several Kentucky school districts are pushing for more adequate state funding than what Senate Bill 1 allowed.  Vonda Jennings stated that no other business operates the way schools are asked to; mentioning Kentucky’s recent top 10 ranking in an education quality survey, Jennings said schools are being asked to continue to produce top 10 results with diminishing resources.
 
The Board recognized the BCHS FFA Trap Team Squads for placing first in the Green River Regional Contest, and it recognized Trap Team Squad 1 for placing 10th and Squad 2 for placing 12th in the FFA State Trap Shoot.  Howard also told the Board of a letter from the Department of the Navy regarding which stated that the NJROTC at BCHS scored outstanding or above average on all measures in the Navy’s recent inspection.
 
Howard gave the school district energy report for Jimmy Arnold who was ill and not at the meeting; Howard reported that the Butler County School District is once again the number one district in Kentucky in energy efficiency.  Shannon West of Carr, Riggs and Ingram CPAs presented the FY 13 Butler County Schools Audit Report.  West stated that general fund had an increase of $1.433 million over FY12, and the Food Service went from an $18,000 loss in FY 12 to a $10,000 profit in FY 13.  Vonda Jennings gave a presentation on FY 13 Program Reviews and said the district would provide details in the report to local media.

In other business, the Board approved disposal by North Butler Elementary School of surplus textbooks by finding a buyer and allowing NBES to keep funds from the sale, in the same manner that Morgantown Elementary School disposed of their surplus textbooks.  The Board approved James Runion and Jason Jones as business/community leader representatives on the Local Planning Committee.  The Board approved BCMS girls basketball fundraisers. The Board approved several trip requests: the BCHS broadcasting class trip to Orlando, Florida on March 19-23; the BCHS yearbook class trip to Opry Mills in Nashville, Tennessee on November 22; the Gifted Talented trip to the Frist Art Museum in Nashville on November 25; the BCMS STLP trip to the Louisville Science Center, Muhammad Ali Museum, and Louisville Slugger Museum on November 21; the BCMS cheerleader trip to state competition at Eastern Kentucky University on January 11; the BCHS FFA trip to Murray State University on November 19-20; and the All-State Band trip to Eastern Kentucky University.

Story by Don Thomason, Beech Tree News/WlBQ 1570.