Principal: State ranking improves for high school

Daniel Boone High School Principal Preston McKnight told the school board Oct. 10 that the high school’s state ranking has improved to No. 184, an increase of 223 points from 2015.

State rankings are determined by results from the Keystone Exams, Advanced Placement tests, SAT’s, attendance and graduation rates, as well as the under-represented populations of minorities, poverty, special education, and how the district is assisting them.

“The state rankings are a school performance profile, and we moved up 223 slots, out of 676 state high schools,” said McKnight. He attributed the increased ranking to teacher dedication to instructing students,

regular student interaction by guidance counselors, transparency of lesson plans, increased Advanced Placement enrollment, increased SAT enrollment, improved Keystone Exam scores.

“I think this is what’s moving the school forward,” said McKnight, “students are taking things learned from teachers and now leading the community.

“People have said that people are moving away from here because [they say] of the lack of education,” said board member Richard Martino, adding, “I think the level of education is doing quite well.”

In other business, the board approved 6-3 the tentative agreement with the Daniel Boone Federation of Support Staff.

Board members Carol Beitz, Connor Kurtz and Martino opposed the motion.

“We need to cap our salaries, and this contract does not do that,” said Martino, adding that the contract includes a 3 percent salary increase. “Salaries are out of control and just seem to get worse.” He said the district needs to control the number of its employees with no salary increases.

Martino read a statement he prepared regarding the need for pension reform in Pennsylvania. “It’s extremely hard to allocate funds for educational programs when the [district] budget has experienced over $5 million in pension increases for the past five years.” “In 2009-10, our annual pension cost was less than $1 million; this year it’s over $6 million,” said Martino. “The [Pennsylvania] legislature is supposedly going to work on pension reform—again! I don’t think the public and/or the local news media fully understand the negative impact of state pensions on local school districts. The only, and I emphasize only, control we have over pension costs is to hold the line on salaries, since pensions are based on salary expenditures, and to control the number of employees on our pension rolls. To that end, we have outsourced Food Service and Custodial Services, but have not effectively controlled remaining salaries.”

Board President Michael Wolfe said the support staff includes aides, secretaries and information technology employees. He said the Federation is expected to approve the contract by Oct. 24.

The Federation’s previous contract ran from July 1, 2013 to June 30, 2015.

Amy Hicks, president of the Daniel Boone Education Association, said the teachers have started a second school year without an approved contract. The previous contract expired June 30, 2015.

An arbitration hearing is scheduled for Oct. 20 before the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board.

The board reviewed its updated Enrollment Study with new live birth information. In 2013, there were 15 less live births in 2012. It also states that in June 2017, more seniors will graduate (total of 261) than the number of first grade students entering the district (a total of 207).

“That fits the model (by Kim Seldomridge, previous interim business manager) of losing about 100 students a year, a trend that will continue,” said Martino.

Wolfe recommended that the district do an overlay in June of the previously projected enrollment numbers versus actual numbers.

Board member David Rathgeb said “these are the [enrollment] numbers that will be used to consider closing BEC (Birdsboro Elementary Center).” Due to decreasing enrollment, the school board voted last spring to begin moving students out of BEC and into Amity Elementary Center and Monocacy Elementary Center. They said it is their intention to begin closing BEC in February 2017. Students scheduled to start third grade at Birdsboro Elementary Center for 2016-17, have already been relocated to Amity Elementary Center.

“Enrollment is now higher than predicted—in consideration of closing my neighborhood school,” said Birdsboro Borough Council Vice President Cindy McGee on Oct. 10. “These numbers are now inaccurate, and it looks less good to move students into two buildings (Amity Elementary Center and Monocacy Elementary Center).”

“I ask you to wait the full three years [before closing BEC].”

“Your numbers don’t support this, but you keep moving forward. You’re not putting the brakes on. Think about it now to reverse this decision and not do it.”

Wolfe said af ter the meeting that McGee was referring to the enrollment numbers presented last spring by Harris, which were the then current numbers, “as of today.”

“The only enrollment numbers used from now on will be the Seldomridge model,” said Wolfe, adding that the Seldomridge model overestimated by 10 students.