The Examiner U-46 News Feed

U-46 expense items given unanimous approvalv

By Seth Hancock
  The Board of Education in School District U-46 unanimously approved, via a 7-0 vote, of $760,693 in expenditure items at its May 16 meeting.
  Presented and approved that evening were travel expenses for board members and staff to attend the Illinois Association of School Boards (IASB) annual conference. The IASB is a taxpayer funded lobbyist organization for government schools, and the conference is where members vote on what the group will lobby for in the coming session.
  “The Triple I Joint Annual Conference will be held in Chicago November 18-20, 2022,” Evelyn Bevins, assistant superintendent for board matters, wrote in a memo. “The cost to attend the conference is $499.00 per person. Lodging requires a $200.00 (non-refundable) per room deposit at the time of booking. The costs of lodging are up to $205.00 (without tax) per room per night. Registration will open Monday, June 6, 2022.”
  The total cost approved was $5,750 for board members Sue Kerr, Dawn Martin, Veronica Noland, Melissa Owens, Eva Porter and Kate Thommes to attend as well as Superintendent Tony Sanders and Trisha Olsen, chief legal officer.
  The majority of items approved were from the education fund including $360,150 with QuaverEd.com for a contract renewal through 2026-2027 for an online elementary music curriculum, $130,862 for a one-year contract renewal with Tyler Technologies for the human resources software MUNIS and $41,382 for Japanese and Mandarin Chinese world language expansion of resources with Education Perfect.
  Two items will be paid for by the nation’s taxpayers including $122,500 to Northwestern University Center for Talent Development for a “differentiated enrichment summer experience… designed to meet the academic and social and emotional needs of gifted learners,” the proposal states, as well as $72,802 with Scholastic, Inc. for the elementary summer school literacy resource LitCamp.
  From the operations and maintenance fund was $27,248 with Grade Restoration and Construction Services to make concrete repairs on the front sidewalk and curbing at Bartlett’s Centennial Elementary School.
  Also approved unanimously that evening was $9.6 million in itemized bills and a personnel report and workers’ compensation cases that included one new position, a paraeducator.