Oskaloosa School Board For August 14
Oskaloosa Community School Administration
by R.D. Keep
Oskaloosa’s school board wrapped a successful school year and looked to the new school year, which begins Monday. The board members heard from staff reports regarding some of those successes.
Curriculum director, Mary Cooksley presented the districts annual progress report. The report, ladened with facts and figures, painted a picture of continued improvement for Oskaloosa students in math and reading.
Cooksley stated while overall students fell just short of the No Child Left Behind trajectory targets, there was strong growth in a number of classes. She emphasized that the comparisons with the district learning goals and benchmarks were changed when measured against the Iowa Assessment.
“This is just one piece of information we look at,” said Cooksley. “It is an important piece of information, but not the only part of assessment we look at.”
She stated the report is available at each school building for community members to read.
The board held a public hearing in preparation for the sale of the Building Trades home on South M Street. The board also approved the building of a home just south of this year’s home. It will be a three-bedroom two-bath ranch similar to what has been built in the past few years.
The Oskaloosa City Council will entertain approval of the final plat for eight lots on the South M Street school-owned property at its meeting on Monday. It is anticipated that bids will be able to be received sometime this fall.
Jennifer Peterson, elementary physical education teacher, made a presentation on the community Blue Zone project, part of the Iowa Healthiest state initiative. Also speaking were YMCA Executive director Dawn Stephens and high school instructor Ginny Foster.
The project is looking at a Blue Zone project for Oskaloosa and Mahaska County and implement strategies and were asking support for the project application.
The trio said the project would focus on the “Power of Nine.” The Power of nine concepts include: Move naturally, Know your purpose, Down shift, 80 percent rule, Plant slant, Wine at 5, Family first, Belong and Right tribe.
They stated that 70 percent are things a person can control. Fifty percent of those things are the changing of health behaviors and 20 percent is environment. The remaining 30 percent are things that cannot be changed greatly, especially heredity.
The application is due on August 27. Review takes place in September and finalists are announced October 8. From October 29-November 16 demonstration site visits will take place and the final demonstration sites will be announced in January.
In other business:
Board member Laurie Fiscella reported that she is a member of the legislative committee of Iowa Association of School Boards and will meet with them on August 21 to go over the issues submitted by the school boards as legislative priorities.
Dr. Reiter stated that the board would visit Webster and the new transportation facility before the board meeting in September.
Approved grade level benchmarks for advanced fitness
Approved grade level benchmarks for a number of business courses
Approved the course and benchmarks for virtual reality education pathway at the high
school
Approved retain age for Hooyer construction for elevator project for $8,429.03 to complete the project
Appointed Tom Richardson as school board representative to the Oskaloosa Education Foundation
Next meeting of the board will be at 7:30 p.m. on September 11.
