North Nodaway BOE

The North Nodaway R-VI Board of Education met in open and closed sessions on September 20 to handle the following school district business:

High School/Middle School Principal Tim Conn reported about implementing the Blue Dot System in the Hopkins building. This system has teachers and staff, who are willing to listen or help students with problems, put a blue dot outside their door.

Students may go to any of the blue dot personnel and state “I need to have a blue dot conversation.” This will cue the adult that it is important and they need to listen. It provides an opportunity for the student to begin the conversation.

North Nodaway has switched from a late start on Mondays for professional development (PD) to using the entire day for PD. This, Superintendent James Simmelink said, allows for more in-depth topic coverage.

Simmelink also went over the initial results from the MSIP for the 2016-17 school year and told the board why the Annual Performance Review (APR) had not been received. The state determined that the results on the 2017 English II and Algebra I end of course (EOC) tests were not comparable to previous years and wouldn’t be used to determine the APR.

The APR score is used to determine school district certification and funding. Simmelink didn’t think that the NN APR would be affected this year.

The A+ program is going to allow students to use the Algebra I EOC score to qualify for the program.

Bus routes were approved. The board approved the 2018 senior trip to St. Louis. The students will be gone for four days.

The substitute teacher list, including Louise Runde, John Cerrone, Beth Wells, Katherine Hansen, Kyle VandeMheern, Dianne Kohler, Lisa Hise and Carla Vore, was approved.