RUMFORD – SAD 43 board members on Monday decided to take no further action on an earlier decision to change the use of Virginia Elementary School.
“That decision was made in January,” said Rumford representative David McKivergan. “Now it’s time to get to work and move on.”
Residents in a nonbinding vote at last week’s election voted in support of the board’s decision 532-436.
The board in January voted to end the school’s 50-year use as an elementary school at an estimated savings of about $150,000. Instead, a portion of the school will be used as the site of the district’s Pennacook Day Treatment Program. The program will accommodate about 15 youngsters who had been sent out of the district to be educated.
The school’s 110 pupils in kindergarten through grade five will be sent to either Meroby Elementary School in Mexico or Rumford Elementary School.
Some parents of Virginia school pupils had circulated a petition to keep the school for elementary education. The board then decided to put the question before voters. If the vote had been significantly in favor of retaining its current use, the board may have considered taking another vote.
During the past few months, Mexico and Rumford elementary schools have been working to ease the transition of Virginia school pupils by inviting them and their parents to tour their new schools.
The district’s student population has continued to slide during the past few years. Hodgkin said sufficient space is available for Virginia school pupils in the two other district elementary schools.
In other matters, the board ratified a three-year contract for the district’s nine administrators that includes 3 percent salary increases for 2005-2006 and 2006-2007, and a 3.5 percent increase in the 2007-2008 school year. New this year is the inclusion of the technology coordinator and athletic director as part of the administrative unit.
The board welcomed newly elected members Randy Canwell from Mexico and Ed Flynn from Rumford. It also re-elected Linda Westleigh as chairwoman of the board, and Michael Papsadora as chairman.
Hodgkin said 30 applications were submitted for Mountain Valley High School assistant principal. He said a candidate’s name may be submitted at the July 11 meeting.
Directors approved spending $100,000 for the lease and purchase of about 120 laptop computers from money set aside in a technology reserve account or from grants. With this vote, all students in grades seven to 12 will have access to laptop computers.
The board reduced the full-time business teacher position at the high school to part-time.
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