FR approves staff plan

FORT RECOVERY –– Fort Recovery Local Schools will be finished with its Virtual Academy program at the end of the school year.

Some elementary staffing changes will be made as well.

Superintendent Larry Brown confirmed the program will end while discussing the 2021-22 staffing plan at the Fort Recovery School Board meeting Monday. It was originally intended as a pilot program to combat coronavirus-related absences.

“We have a strong number of students who are returning to in-class learning,” he explained.

The new staffing plan, which was approved by school board, is based on the 2020 fall financial forecast. Numbers for enrollment and open enrollment are projected to be similar to pre-COVID numbers, Brown explained.

With the return of virtual academy students and single-year homeschooling students, virtual academy liaison teachers will return to their assigned Fort Recovery schools.

There is a “bubble” of 93 kindergarten students projected in the fall, compared to about 55 students moving on to first grade, Brown continued, so the school has reassigned some staff to reflect those numbers. There will be no planned changes to staff in grades 6 through 12.

The school is also projecting to enter into deficit spending in the next few years –– the fall forecast indicated about a $156,819 deficit starting in fiscal 2021. Deficits were also expected to continue at $480,208 in 2022, $805,956 in 2023 and more than $1 million each of the next two years.

Those deficits would drop the district’s year-end balance to $2.7 million by the end of fiscal year 2025. (School board plans to meet at 6 p.m. next month to discuss the 2021 spring financial forecast.)

Also Monday, middle school principal Ryan Steinbrunner noted the auditeria will be getting a new sound and lighting system after receiving donations from the community (about $11,000 was accepted at Monday’s meeting) and funds from the school. The current system is about 20 years old, with the light board still running on a floppy disk drive, he explained.

New microphones should be received before the spring band and choir concerts. Amplifiers and other sound equipment, including the light board, will be replaced in the summer. Steinbrunner added that the current microphones have a tendency to cut out during programs.

“Things like that are not giving the kids the best opportunity to showcase their abilities,” Steinbrunner said.

In other business, school board members:

•Approved the following: two-year non-teaching contracts for Elaine Pax, Shelly Overman, Jerry Stammen, Kate Timmerman, Bonita Fortkamp and Sheri Grove; two-year teaching contracts for Chris Guggenbiller, Victoria Horstman, Chelsea Kahlig and Reid Knuth; Michelle Stammen, Judy Fortener, Abby Scheidt, Jill Dues, Maleia Jutte and Melissa Homan, and substitutes Kim Pohlman, Kim Niekamp and Courtney Bettinger as summer school teachers and substitutes; an overnight trip for the high school marching band, color guard and senior choir to Chicago from March 4, 2022, through March 6, 2022; a first reading of policy additions, revisions and replacements.

•Accepted several donations, including $11,400 from several donors (most notably $5,000 from the Fort Recovery Music Boosters) for the new elementary/middle school auditeria sound equipment and $3,350 from Fort Recovery Radio for athletics.

•Hired several employees for the 2021-22 school year and renewed supplemental contracts, including for junior high and high school coaches and club advisors. Kassidy York is a new hire for the middle school, and both Chris Guggenbiller (high school girls basketball assistant coach) and Carly Roth (junior high volleyball assistant coach) were removed from the list.

•Accepted non-teaching employee Michael Schwieterman’s resignation effective on the last day of the current school year.