The Examiner U-46 News Feed
U-46 Board prepared to vote on varied proposals
By Seth Hancock
The Board of Education in School District U-46 is set to vote on expenditure items totaling $531,670 at its upcoming meeting on Monday, Aug. 26.
The votes will be on 10 total items that were presented and briefly discussed at the Aug. 12 board meeting. Board member Melissa Owens was absent at that meeting.
The largest proposal is for interactive boards, costing $67,500 from Dell EMC, and interactive board stands, $36,750 from PACE Systems, Inc. for elementary libraries. The items will be paid for by the education fund if approved.
“The Literacy Department in collaboration with the Elementary Library Leadership team recommends that each elementary library have an interactive board bundle… to demonstrate the use of library online resources,” the proposal states.
A contract renewal with Gorbold Behavioral Consulting, Inc. has a cost of $75,000, the same price as last year, and would be paid for by the nation’s taxpayers through grant funds.
Gorbold would “provide training, assessments, interventions, and/or diagnostic procedures including Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA)” to “support students with autism and experiencing social emotional challenges across the district based on student” individualized education plans (IEP), the proposal states.
Board member Kate Thommes asked how many students will receive ABA services to which Leatrice Satterwhite, director of specialized student services, said: “We do not provide ABA services as a district, but these individuals provide workshops and training that you would use with ABA for our staff.”
Thommes asked if families can opt their students out of ABA and Satterwhite said: “That’s fine because we don’t provide direct ABA services to any U-46 students.”
With Northwest Illinois Association, the district is asking for a contract renewal costing $70,462 (grant funds) “to help district staff identify and diagnose children with hearing, vision, orthopedic, and multi-impairments” according to the proposal. The cost is down from $123,435 last year “due to number of students graduating in 2019.”
A contract renewal with Van Acker and Associates has a price tag of $68,250 (grant funds), up from $63,720, for a behavior consultant.
“The district continues to need assistance from an expert in behavior with restructuring the Emotional Disability (ED) self-contained program and conduct training embedded in empowering district educators to understand student behaviors as well as the root causes to challenging student behaviors in order to be more proactive and to respond appropriately and effectively,” the proposal states.
Costing $51,490 (grant funds), the district is asking for a contract renewal with Embrace IEP for software for data management of 504 plans. The cost is down from $55,433 when the software was piloted at four district schools.
Thommes asked if it was the same software as previously used to which Satterwhite said “it is not” but was piloted adding that the previous online system went to a new version which would require staff training. Thommes asked if parents have access to the software and Satterwhite said she was not sure but the district can send electronic IEPs to parents with the software.
A proposal with Dale Carnegie Training has a cost of $48,300 (education fund) for professional development of operations staff.
Jeff King, deputy superintendent of operations, said this will be the third year of the professional development.
Sue Kerr, the board’s president, asked if the same people will be trained. King said the training was the same each of the last two years and this “will build on the previous two,” and a selective process will be used to determine who receives the training.
A contract renewal with Unified Business Solutions has a cost of $30,067 (education fund) for Microsoft Dynamics GP2016 software used for purchasing and financial operations. The cost is up from $29,844.
With Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, the district is asking for a contract renewal costing $29,025 (education fund) for READ 180 and System 44 programs. The cost is up from $27,825.
“READ 180 is a multimedia program that is designed to meet the specific needs of students whose reading achievement is below grade level,” and “System 44 is a foundational reading program designed for the struggling readers,” according to the proposal.
A contract renewal with BMC Software, Inc. costs $28,536 (education fund) for its Footprints software which the proposal says is “a flexible integrated IT service management platform which provides end-to-end flow for Incident and Problem Management.” The cost is up from $21,960.
A bid with Wisco has a price tag of $26,290 (grant funds) to purchase 11 metal inert gas welding machines for Elgin High School. The “welders are needed for students to perform the specified tests” in order to earn welder certifications.
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