001Welcome to the Watsburg Area School School District where we are student centered and future focused for world-class education. I now call to order the Monday, March 16th regular board meeting area school district board of directors. Would you please rise for the pledge of allegiance? >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> May I have a roll call, please? Mr. Glazer >> present. >> Mr. Brumagen >> present. >> Mrs. Heatherington >> here. >> Mr. Morve >> here. >> Dr. Pushchek >> here. >> Mr. Snippert. >> Mrs. Will >> here. >> Dr. Williams >> here. >> Mr. Young >> present. Thank you. Uh now we're entertain a motion to approve the agenda
002as presented or amended. >> So move Blazer. >> Second. Push check. >> All in favor please say I. >> I. Motion carries. Um, I'll now entertain a motion to approve the minutes from the regular board meeting on February 16th. >> So moved. Heatherington. >> Second. Will. >> All in favor, please say I. >> I. Oppos. Nay. Motion carries. I will now entertain a motion to approve the minutes from the March 9th work session. >> Blazer. Second. >> All in favor, please say I. >> I. Nay. That motion also carries. All right, we'll now turn to school reports. Dr. Berlin. >> Uh, no report. >> No report for this evening. Thank you. It's now time for guests and citizen comments. Do we have anyone signed up to speak with us this evening? >> Thank you for
003that. And we'll now turn back to Dr. Berlin for the superintendent report. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Um, just a couple slides here. Thank you, Mr. President. Just a couple slides uh for the board to update you on a a few things coming up. So, we're all having a good time tonight. >> Are we going to have school tomorrow? >> Well, we all have something. >> Neither of us know what I'm about to say. >> Okay. So, um I thought I'd just run you down through a few things um that we're going to tackle at the end of the year. Uh we do have some policy updates on for a first reading tonight and then we have a few more coming and I'll share that. I'll talk a little bit about where the phone free
004schools is at right now and uh the education report from PSBA uh was just published and I I just pulled a few key financial indicators there. Um, and I I think you'll see you get a flavor for what's happening across the state and how how we're kind of hanging in there. Um, so coming up for next month, we have a few policies that are under review by uh legal. We've always had this exemption from instruction policy and it it actually lines up with um Pennsylvania school code and PA code that allows exemption uh for certain religious beliefs for um certain instructional things. So, Pennsylvania's kind of always had this uh this case happened over in Maryland, this Muhammad versus Taylor, and this went to the Supreme Supreme Court in 2025. And there was a group
005of parents that reacted strongly um for religious and moral beliefs against uh some of the programming. And initially the school district there had allowed them to opt out but then later um rolled back on that decision and I and I think that was probably the catalyst that that took it all the way into the courts. Um so it doesn't impact our policy or practices um very much but it it does kind of reiterate and reaffirm that parents have a constitutional right. uh it you know to monitor students education and um opt out of certain things under certain circumstances. uh social media. We don't have this policy. It's recommended and uh it deals with guidelines around uh hosting the district rather hosting a website. Of course, we have or a social media site and we do
006have a Facebook page. Uh so more and more districts are moving things up into social media and those of course have you know pretty unfettered public access uh or can so there's some guidelines from PSBA uh that um steer districts towards you know what's safe what what are the kind of things you might be able to prohibit from a website you know if you allow posting who gets to post if you allow the public to post, how far does that go and all those things. So, it gives you some guidelines there. And then therapy dogs uh is different than service animals, which is on the agenda for this evening. And it's actually complimentary or an extension of service animals. Uh service animals are required by ADA. If a, you know, if a student needs a
007dog because they're blind and the dog helps them navigate the school, that's not something that we can deny. Therapy animals kind of fall into a different category. Uh, they don't have the same level of training. There's there are a few recognized certification programs. Uh, but they don't um have like a a broad endorsement for handicapped students, but they have their place. And we have o over the past few years when we've had unfortunate incidents um we've been able to have some trained therapy dogs come in for the day and uh the students benefited from that I think um get good feedback uh but this is just a recommended policy uh that Knox put together for us a lot of other districts are using it so it works in tandem so if it's ADA uh compliance
008or you know a real um obvious handicap then uh the service animal policy would apply and then other types of requests for animals were covered under therapy dogs. So it doesn't mean everyone can bring phto to school. I mean there you know there has to be some type of um certification that is recognized even though it may not be recognized to the extent of a um Americans with Disability Act. So that's upcoming. Phone free schools. We talked about this a little bit I think last month. We know that the Senate passed this phone free or school free phone free schools bill uh back in February. And so you know where is it right now? Well, it's been moved over to the House. So it's not a law yet. There's probably going to be a lot
009of negotiating or potentially so and that'll be and not only did it go to the house, they quickly before they adjourned on February 4th, I think shuttled it to the ed their education committee and that's usually where a lot of the horse trading happens with these kind of things. Um, but I thought I would tell you what's actually in this bill because I I the there's there was blurbs here and there in different pieces of media that I've read, but I wasn't sure myself. Is it a complete ban? Does it lunch? Can you do this, that, and the other thing? So, I spent a little bit of time looking that up. Um, now the House comes back on March 23rd. Uh and as I said before, it's important to watch that, but we may have
010to decide as a board if we want to uh make a decision sooner or not. So, in the current form, the bill that was shuttled over to the House Education Committee, it prohibits all cell phone use by students from bell to bell, and it really means bell to bell. It does talk about use versus possession. So students could have their phones in their possession, but they wouldn't be permitted to use them during the whole day. And the application is uniform. And that was one of the things that wasn't clear to me. Uh it it means instructional and non-instructional time. So that's how the law sits right now. U now whether that's how it will emerge or not, we'll see. I there's a lot of school districts that are voicing opposition to this because they believe
011they should have um more local control over when and where which that's been, you know, that's school boards in Pennsylvania. That's how we do things. Uh as much local control as were permitted. So it narrowly defines a few exceptions. Launch isn't one of them. Recess isn't one of them. uh but certain medical conditions or accommodations that you might need. Uh teacherdirected use I thought was interesting. That's only with principal consent. There's a three par principal consent limited amount of time and only if you don't have access to a district uh device, electronic device, and for instructional purposes. And there's limited flexibility on how districts can manage or would be able to manage phones, but it comes down to the the logistics of storing the phones. So, is it going to be in the lockers? Is
012it going to be off and away in a gym bag? Um you I mean you can imagine different scenarios but that's that's what the districts would have to uh make some decisions on what works best for them there as is. We'll see. And then finally uh the state of education report. I just pulled out kind of the financial uh parts because we're coming into budgeting season and uh it's it's much the same as it has been despite the uh the BEF lawsuit and the $5 billion that they've underfunded. You know, we're benefiting from that with the tax ad adequacy right to um right to learn grant tucked in there. We do benefit from that. But still, districts like us and across Pennsylvania, I mean, rural districts are the most numerous uh even if we don't
013make the most noise or collect the most revenue, but we're primarily uh 50% funded affair and that's where we have been uh for quite a few years now. Um, that's that's a challenge, but we we've been keeping our nose above water. I think thanks to the board's efforts, we've been keeping our nose uh much more above board than other districts. So, I think we're in pretty good shape. Uh, and this is interesting here. If you look at all the expenses that are mandated, pushed, or otherwise occur with school districts, school districts really are controlling what they control. salaries are following the market uh and all other expenses. I mean they just pale in comparison to the top three. Now special ed you you can't do anything about that. I always tell our staff you know
014a special ed student needs what they need and you know that's what you provide for them. Um, but charter school tuition, as we know, just continues to climb like a rocket. And the pensions, I think it's going to level off here. Vicki might be able to speak to that. I I think the worst of it has has hit and we're going to kind of level off, but it's still still a big contribution. It's a big part of the budget. Actually the pension rate for the percentage that the district pays is going down from this year. I think this year it's 34% and next year it's 33.59%. So getting a little bit of a break. >> So we're kind of at the top of the mountain except who knows if we'll ever come down. And this
015is just another way to look at it. mandated costs uh versus how much state federal revenue increases we've had. So, it's no mystery why property taxes are going up. There's nowhere else to go. And Pennsylvania is one of the worst when it comes to um underwriting or supporting education on a statewide level. I think we're generally down into that 36 37% as a whole. Uh where other states the majority of states are closer to 50% or even higher in their um support. And then despite the increases that we've had in in BEF, I thought this was kind of the money shot. uh it's a just a huge disparity and once again it falls on the the taxpayers. Uh so and that's kind of some bleak news but the good news is we're doing very well.
016Um we're as I said above boards and I think we're supplying our students with excellent programming and materials uh and so on. So that's just what I wanted to share tonight. a little bit of look at the end of the year from policy and budgeting perspective. That's all I had. Mr. President, >> thank you, Dr. Berlin. Are there any questions for Dr. Berlin? >> All right, hearing none. Uh we'll now turn it over to Mrs. Vicky Bendig for our business administrator's report. >> Thank you, Mr. President. for tonight. Uh the treasur's reports as reported last week, uh general fund 13,961,3052 as of February 28th. Um the year-to- date budget versus actual report, we are 66 almost 67% of the fiscal year completed. Uh we have received um 69.5% of our total budgeted revenues. We have
017spent 56.18% of our total budgeted expenditures. And if you take the collected revenue minus the already expended expenditures, we have $4,648,316.7 of our net budget remaining. Um capital projects uh as of the end of February, $18.65. Cafeteria, $850,96.84. And for the month um of February in the cafeteria, we had a profit of $400.92, which brings our year-to-ate profit to $20,761.38. Um the student activities accounts have $60,472.69 collectively at the end of February. Moving on to the bill lists. Um, checks already written prior to the work session reported last week. Checks already written between the work session and board meeting for tonight. $8,553.71. And then the bill list for the board approval uh general fund $432,888.64 and the cafeteria was $50,246.82. There were no capital projects checks and that is all I have. >> Thank you,
018Mrs. Bending. Are there any questions for Mrs. Bending on the treasures reports? >> Hearing none, I'll entertain a motion to approve the business reports, payments, and invoices as presented. >> So move push check. >> Second. Heatherington. >> Any additional questions, comments, or concerns? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. >> I. >> Oppos? Nay. Motion carries. Thank you, Mrs. Bendig. Uh, we do have one item under legal advisement for this evening. This is for a safety contract uh for one of our students. So I will entertain a motion to approve the resolution regarding the student discipline as outlined. >> So move blazer. >> Second snippet. >> Any questions on that one? Hearing none. All in favor please say I. I oppose. Name. >> That motion carries. Thank you all. Uh chair will now recognize
019Dr. Andrew Pushche for finance. >> Thank you Mr. President. Four items tonight. Um we're going to take them individually. Um 7A approve the monthly budgetary transfer from budget to actual as presented. So moved for a second. >> Any questions on that one? Hearing none. All in favor please say I. >> I opposed. Nay. Motion carries. >> Thank you. 7B is the Northwest Tri County Intermediate Unit 2627 budget. Uh the motion is to approve the budget in the amount of 78,99,222 with the Wattsburg Area School District contribution as indicated below. So moved. >> Second, Blazer. >> Any questions on that one? >> Hearing none. May I have a roll call, please? >> Mr. Blazer. Yes, >> Mr. Brumagen. >> Yes, >> Mrs. Heatherington. >> Yes, >> Mr. Morve. >> Yes, >> Dr. Pushchek. >> Yes, >>
020Mr. Snippert. >> Yes, >> Mrs. Will. >> Yes, >> Miss Dr. Williams. >> Yes, >> Mr. Young. >> Yes. >> And the motion carries. Thank you, everyone. >> Thank you. 7 C is the Erie County Tech School Budget. The motion is to approve the Erie County Technical School budget total expenditures of $9,476,39 with the Erie County District contribution and the Wattsburg area district contribution listed below. So move >> second, Blazer. >> Any questions on the Erie County test school budget? >> Hearing none. May I have a roll call, please? >> Mr. Blazer, >> yes. >> Mr. Brumagen? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Heatherington. >> Yes. >> Mr. Morve, >> yes. >> Dr. Pushchek, >> yes. >> Mr. Snippert, >> yes. >> Mrs. Will, >> yes. >> Dr. Williams, >> yes. >> Mr. Young, >> yes. >>
021And motion carries. Thank you, Dr. Push. And the final item 7D is the fund transfers to approve the fund transfers as outlined below. So moved. >> More second. >> Does anyone have any questions on the fund transfers? >> Mr. President, not a question, but just to remind the board under future project commitments, the struck out portion was an estimate of the district contribution for that grant with the actual cost below on the addendum. Um, very close to the original estimate, but the actual cost is listed there. >> Thank you, Dr. Pushchek. Any others? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. >> I oppose. Nay. >> And that motion carries. >> That's all I have this evening, Mr. President. >> Thank you, Dr. Pushchek. Chair will now recognize Mr. sorry Dr. Jesse Williams for buildings
022and grounds. >> Thank you Mr. President. Um I have two things under buildings and ground and without any objections I would like to move both of those. Um the first one is a that's carpet replacement that is to approve the carpet replacement at the high school third floor classrooms for a grand total of 172,94352 as attached. The second is the public school facilities improvement grant to approve the DCED act 34 public school facilities improvement grant resolution. The application fee is 100 and the commitment of 203,294 for the project outline. So moved Williams >> second blazer. >> Any questions on either of those two items hearing? None. All in favor please say I. I post nay. Those motions carry. Thank you, Dr. Williams. Chair will now recognize Mr. Jeremy Blazer for personnel. >> Thank you, Mr.
023President. Without objection, there are three items under personnel I'd like to move as one this evening. Uh A is appointments to approve the motion to approve the following appointments as outlined and listed below, including the addendum items. Uh B is conference requests. Motion to approve the conser conference requests as outlined. Uh there's one from last week and additional on the addendums. And then C is to add the ESS substitute list additions as outlined on uh the items as well as the addendum. >> So moved. >> Second. Push check. >> Any questions on those three items? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. I. >> Oppose. Nay. >> Those three motions carry. Thank you, Mr. Blazer. >> Thank you. >> The chair will now recognize Mr. Steven Morv for policy. >> Mr. President, I have
024one item under policy this evening and that is the uh first reading of the uh various policies as listed. Those include uh attendance uh weapons service animals in schools, safety, emergency preparedness and response attached safety safe procedures, relations with law enforcement agencies and school security personnel. Uh the files are attached. So moved. >> Second snippet. Are there any questions on any of the policies under the readings for this evening? >> Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. I. >> Oppos? Nay. That motion carries. Thank you very much, Mr. Morgan. >> Thank you, Mr. President. >> Uh, the chair will now recognize Mr. Aaron Snipper for curriculum. >> Thank you, Mr. President. I have four items this evening, two of which are addendum items. Uh, if there is no objection, I'd like to move all
025of them. Uh, subject A is Penn State Baron Mentor Project Partner Agreement. to approve a partner agreement between the Wattsburg Area School District and Penn Strate Penn State Baron for a mentoring program for WAMS. Uh subject B is a new high school business course to approve a new business course communications for media and yearbook production course description for Senica High School. Uh, addendum item C is a Penn West University affiliation agreement to approve an affiliation agreement between Penn West University and Wattsburg Area School District for student teacher experience 2026 through 2031. And the final item subject D is an addendum item homebound instruction to approve homebound instruction for the Watchar School District student as outlined. So moved. >> Second, Blazer. Any questions on those four items for Mr. Snipper? >> Mr. President, just a quick
026question. Um, not sure. Do we don't I and it spurred my comment or thought because a business class was uh being added. >> Do we have an actual just a typing or a I don't know a keyboard class? I mean, is specific to that or is there parts of that within the business curriculum? >> Yeah, it's actually uh at the middle school. So, we purchase a program called uh I typing I believe um or edgy typing, I'm sorry. it was bought out this past year. Uh, and that's actually part of the STEM curriculum. So, it's not just typing, but it also includes just shortcuts, basic use of word, internet searches, that sort of thing. >> So, Madison missed it. Sorry. >> I don't think she took it. >> No, she would have had something with
027it. Um, I don't know. >> I asked her and she said, "No, we didn't do any typing." >> So, maybe I don't know. You're going back before my tenure in this role, so I don't know what >> we had some sort of program, but it might have been the same thing. >> Very well. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Morve. Any others? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. I. >> Oppos? Nay. Those four motions carry. >> That's all I have this evening. Mr. >> Thank you, Mr. Sniffer. Chair will now recognize Mr. Greg Remington for technology. >> Mr. President, I have one item tonight underneath technology. Item A, parent square website hosting agreement to approve the agreement between Watsbury area school district and parent square to provide a district website implementation and hosting
028services as attached. So move. Second Heatherington. >> Any questions on that one? >> Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. I. >> Oppos? Nay. That motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Bumagen. >> Chair will now recognize Miss Veronica will for transportation. >> Thank you, Mr. President. I have one item under transportation this evening that I'd like to move there are no objections. Um, a transportation request to approve the transportation request and ratification of field trips since the last meeting as attached. So moved. >> Second. Push check. Any questions on that one? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. >> I oppose. Nay. That motion carries. Thank you, Mrs. Well. Chair will now recognize Miss Leah Heatherington for athletic and extracurricular. >> Thank you, Mr. President. I have um four item, three original items and
029an addendum as a fourth item for tonight. Um and without objection, I will move them all at the same time. Um first one is volunteer list additions. It's to approve the volunteers as listed. Uh B is athletic appointments and is to approve athletic appointments as listed. C is wrestling head coach girls position MOA. Um to approve the memorandum of agreement between Wattsburg and uh WA to create the position of head coach for the girls wrestling team as listed. And the last is D, an addendum, extracurricular appointments to approve extracurricular appointments for next school year as listed. So moved. >> Second by motion. >> Any questions on those four items from Miss Heatherington? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. >> I. Oppos? Nay. Those four motions carry. Thank you, Miss Heatherington. Uh under miscellaneous
030this evening, we do have some surplus items. Uh you'll see in the attachments uh their middle school textbook uh surplus list and a marching band surplus list. I'll now entertain a motion to approve the attached items as surplus. >> So move Blazer. >> Second, Heatherington. >> Any questions about old textbooks or marching band surplus? Hearing none. All in favor, please say I. I. >> I. Oppose. Nay. >> Those that motion carries. Thank you. Uh the chair will now recognize Mr. Steven Morve for the Erie County Technical School joint operating committee report. >> Mr. President, there was uh no meeting in February due to the unfortunate death of the student right before the uh scheduled board meeting. So therefore, everything has been tabled into the uh March board meeting which is the last Thursday of the
031month. Um and we've already gone through the budget proposal. So I don't there's no need to revisit that. >> Excellent. >> That's all we have. >> Thank you, Mr. Morv. Does anyone have any questions for Mr. Mor on the tech school? >> All right. Thank you very much for your service. >> Uh the chair will now recognize Dr. Andrew Pushchack for Northwest Tri County Intermediate Unit Board Report. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Brief report. Um thank you to the board for approving the IU budget. Um that vote will get recorded to the IU and then once all of the districts have approved it, um that will go into effect. I thank you for that. Um beyond the board report that Mr. Berlin kindly sent out in his weekly update just one item that was brought
032to my attention on April 8th. Uh Pennsylvania Attorney General Sunday is going to host a meeting at the IU uh for two students from each high school for the topic of social media and its impact on young learners. And that's all I have. Thank you. >> Any questions for Dr. Poch? >> How do you get to be chosen as a student the school? You don't know? >> No idea. >> And when is the >> April 8th? >> Okay. >> Excellent. Thank you. Any others? >> All right. Thank you for your service, Dr. Pushchack. My pleasure. It's now time for board correspondence and dialogue. Does anyone have anything for the good of the order this evening? Hearing none, I'll now entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> So move push check. >> Second. >> All in favor,
033please say I. I oppose. Nay. Motion carries. We are adjourned. Please drive carefully as you depart this evening. Thank you.