Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties
Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties
Contract offered to director of student services
Heidi Vasher
The search to replace outgoing Clay Central/Everly Elementary Principal Curt Busch is becoming clearer.
According to discussion at the April 27 school board meeting, Heidi Vasher has been offered a contract to serve as director of student services. Negotiations are ongoing, but if she accepts, the title would make her principal of the school and allow CC/E to pay her salary with revenue from the district's Dropout Prevention Fund.
"She would be the face of the school and more or less be the leader of the building," CC/E Superintendent Scott Williamson explained after the meeting.
Busch is retiring at the end of the school year. Vasher currently serves as a leadership and learning consultant with Prairie Lakes AEA and works with a variety of school districts throughout northwest Iowa, including CC/E.
"She's a very qualified hire for CC/E," said Assistant Superintendent Jeff Scharn.
Williamson explained naming Vasher director of student services allows the district to utilize monies from the Dropout Prevention Fund that would otherwise be unused.
"Being an elementary-only district, we're not offering alternative school or online courses for upper-level grades," he said, also noting the final details of Vasher's position are still being hashed out. "We need to make sure we have a title that matches the funds appropriately."
Williamson expected everything to be finalized within a week or two.
• Interest shown in Everly bus barn
In other business, Scharn said an individual has expressed interest in purchasing the bus barn at the Everly campus. The 7-12 grade building there closed last year and the district has since been liquidating assets.
The property will be divided into four parcels before any land sale takes place. Williamson said one parcel will include the school building, another will include the FFA building, and the remaining two will include the athletic fields and bus barn.
• Board OKs tuition-out deal with Spencer
The school board unanimously approved a tuition-out agreement with Spencer. The deal replaces CC/E's existing tuition-out contracts with Hartley-Melvin-Sanborn, Sioux Central and Spencer, which were deemed improper by the Iowa Department of Education this winter.
When all four districts' legal counsel crafted the original agreements last year after CC/E ceased offering grades 7-12, attorneys were unaware boundary lines needed to be drawn within the district that would have dictated where students attend school. Because the school board wants 7-12 students to have the most choice as possible, the boundary requirement is voided since CC/E established a tuition-out agreement with only one district. Any 7-12 grade students wishing to go elsewhere can still do so by open-enrolling to their preferred district.
According to previous discussion, two districts without tuition-out agreements can still bring busses into the CC/E district to pick up 7-12 grade students, and Williamson said all three have expressed willingness to maintain existing partnerships. Transportation will only be afforded to those students if they attended CC/E through the sixth grade.
Williamson noted that under the new agreement, CC/E will transport students to and from Spencer. Currently, Spencer picks up CC/E 7-12 grade students if they need transportation.
