Toy Sepulveda, board president, opened the public portion of the August 25 Cobre school board meeting at about 7:20 p.m. He announced that the earlier closed session had started at 6:00 and all board members were present. They had discussed student identifiable information and limited personnel, but no decisions had been made.
As there was no unfinished business, Public Input came next and Linda Pafford of Mimbres was able to state her opinions regarding the on-line minutes. She said it was helpful to have the attachments added, but reminded them that the July 27 minutes were not up until yesterday, August 24. She quoted the New Mexico Open Meetings act, reading from section 10-15-1 paragraph g, and said she requested minutes prior to the next meeting.
When she finished, Sepulveda explained that legal advice said not to post unofficial minutes, as they were not a legal document and those could not be approved ahead of time. Pafford suggested calling them drafts until they could be approved properly; Sepulveda countered that the board was advised not to do that, and they had called the lawyer specifically for her issue. She added that she still objected to the PARCC testing.
Under the Administration topic, Superintendent Robert Mendoza asked that the Title I Application and the Bilingual Application be approved as presented. Each was voted on separately and approved, although Fran Kelly noted that on the Bilingual Application, it was not unanimous.
The review of bills for the month of July showed expenses of $699,762.18 from the operational budget. The largest payment there was a little over $505,000 to the New Mexico Public Schools Insurance Authority. Payroll for that month was $149,316.45 from the operational budget. Sepulveda did mention a variety of checks to Quill Corporation, which Mendoza explained as buying large amounts of office supplies before the start of the new school year, and paying the bills before deadlines came up. He said that was typical for office supply billing at that time of the year. The bills were approved.
In the superintendent's report, Mendoza said on August 26, Wednesday, there would be early dismissal; school would be closed on Monday, September 7, for Labor Day. The first football game of the year would be at Morenci, and he noted the time difference between New Mexico and Arizona. Another early release would be September 18 for homecoming.
He introduced the new student representatives for the year; Jose Rubio, senior, was present and would give the report at this meeting. Hannah Burnette, junior, Marcos Flores, sophomore, and Brianna Martinez, a freshman, would be giving reports to the board throughout the coming year. On September 22, there would be a Region VIII meeting, and the next board meeting would be back on a Monday, September 14, at Hurley Elementary.
He then turned the meeting over to assistant superintendent Jose Carrillo and the three principals involved, Joyce Barela, Daena Davis and Margaret Kesler, for a report on the 25-day period when students in kindergarten, first, second and third returned for the K-3 Plus program.
Carrillo reviewed the past three years of K-3 Plus, stating that in 2013,154 children had attended, as 38 percent of the enrolled students in those grades. In 2014 the numbers went up to 190, which he said was a 19 percent increase, and this year the students attending numbered 203, increasing another 8 percent. He insisted this was not summer school but an extension of the school year.
The benefits of this extra month's work was either improvement or at least maintenance of existing skills the students had at the end of the year, he said. He mentioned the work required of the teachers and the administrators who put on the K-3 Plus program, and told of the benefits the increased attendance made for all involved.
Barela said one improvement in planning was to let parents know in January the dates K-3 Plus would be in session during summer; parents have plenty of time to plan vacations around those dates, so more children do attend. They added more communications, which helped, too. At a parents' night, there was opportunity to get better information. Radio and newspaper advertisements were set up, and weekly progress reports kept parents better informed.
Rubio centered his student report around food. He noticed a shortage of chicken and eggs, flavor in the foods, icing on cinnamon rolls, and a lack of familiar foods, such as posole for breakfast and enchiladas for lunch. He said students asked for these things they wanted, but were told the FDA guidelines had to be followed. In summation: “This is one of the reasons why some foods are dull, and why we can't have certain foods."
In the second public input, Pafford repeated her objection to the PARCC testing. She said she hoped the board would try to reduce the amount of testing kids were subjected to, especially students in high school.
Mendoza said he could report that a committee that had met earlier that day was sending its report to the state public education department about the extensive testing Cobre had been forced to do this year. He said that report would be included in the September meeting and would be on the agenda then. He reminded all that the meeting would be at Hurley on September 14.
The meeting adjourned before 7:50 p.m.