001Items to be considered at the regular meeting of the Board of Education scheduled for Tuesday, March 24th, 2026 at 5:30 p.m. in the unit office conference room, 500 North 10th Street here in Illinois, 62948. If everybody would 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. Mrs. Hastings, if you would please call roll. John Hutchinson Here. Susie Atherton Here. Cindy Miller Here. Kelly Green >> Here. Steve Young >> Here. Steve Robinson Here. This time we'd recognize anybody who would like to address the board. When recognized, that person should give their name before making comments. We ask that statements be limited to 5 minutes in duration. Would
002anybody like to approach the board at at this time? If not, we'll move on to the consent agenda. We need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to adopt and approve the items listed on the consent agenda and not extracted for Tuesday, March 24th, 2026. So moved. Second. Cindy Miller Yes. John Hutchinson Yes. Kelly Green Yes. Susie Atherton Yes. Steve Robinson >> Yes. Steve Young Yes. This time we have an update on the district grants from Mr. Wilson. Yeah, real quick, short and sweet. Just want to let everybody know that that full service community schools grant that was taken away suddenly in December, it has been reinstated through June 30th. So, we've got the rest of this school year, fiscal year. Um anything beyond that, it's still wait and see. They're working on
003an agreement for it, but uh that is a positive update that we have those funds for the remainder of this school year up through June 30th. And that's all I have to report. Okay. Good news. Moving on to new business. Need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the resolution providing for the abatement of taxes levied for the year 2025 to pay the district series 2015 alternate bonds. So moved. Second. Kelly Green? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. >> Steve Robinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. We need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to adopt the amended official school calendar for 2025-2026. So moved. Second. Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. >> Kelly Green? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Need
004a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the agreement with the National Louis University as presented. So moved. Second. Susie Atherton? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the summer drivers ed program as presented. So moved. Second. Steve Robinson? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Um at this time, Mr. Wilson, do you have something with regard to the summer programming? >> Yeah, just on summer programming. Last past few years we've ran about a 4-week, 16-day summer program enrichment remedial throughout the district. This year in light of the budget constraints, we're going to reel that back in. We're going to do about
005a half a program as far as days, 8 days. We won't do quite as many options for students, primarily remedial. We'll still offer a few enrichment options um keep some things going. In addition, and and that would be the school district's expense, um but again, very very shaved down program. We'll still have, because the full-service community schools grant was approved through the end of June, we'll have a a program running through that grant. There'll be an afternoon program for students. So, we're still going to offer our kids quite a bit of summer programming to participate in. Um but it it will be a a very shortened summer session um compared to the past few years. Uh in addition to that, uh last year our food service piece was was part of that. Uh Miss Coffee
006has worked uh her tail off on a food service program for the summer. Now that we all classify as rural, um it'll be a a pickup type of lunch program. Once a week, it will be at the junior high where families can come through and pick up food, and they'll be picking up enough food for a week's worth of lunches basically. Mount Vernon has been doing this for the past few years and has tremendous amount of success with it. Uh Miss Coffee's kind of copying that program. It will essentially cost us nothing to feed families in our area. They will have to sign up for it, and Miss Coffee will start getting signs out in the area. We'll start putting stuff on social media and other areas, so we will be able to feed our
007kids throughout the summer, not just during that summer school program, but throughout the summer. And it will actually be open to students um 18 and under from anywhere in the area, not just Heron students. Uh that's how Mount Vernon has been running theirs. It's a reimbursement program, so Miss Coffee's got uh a real good feeling about this this summer. So, we'll we'll be doing that for our students as well. Can I Can I go back just a minute, uh Mr. Wilson, to the summer program for the remedial Mhm. and for the uh for the others, but have we ever done an assessment to see what benefit that summer program has given our kids over the courses or we just we're rolling it back for budget reasons, I understand. >> Yeah. The assessment as in are
008they making gains academically in their classrooms? I never done anything that formal. I know the high school program credit recovery, they could probably speak to that a little bit with some actual hard data. Um junior high, there's some opportunities for students to get promoted in that regard. Um as far as elementary age kids and what does that do for them academically and tracking did the summer program truly help them move to a better level reading level math level? I I don't have any data like that, no. Thank you. Mhm. Any other questions for Mr. Mr. Wilson regarding the summer program? Seeing none, I need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the summer programming as presented. So moved. Second. Suzy Atherton? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes.
009Cindy Miller? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Moving on to the energy contract, Mr. Wilson has some information on that. Just information here on this. We we've contracted our energy a couple years at a time since I've been here and I know the district has done that prior to my time here as well. Affordable Gas and Electric, AGE, that's the broker that we use to get that done. And thankfully we've had that energy rates locked in. This year alone, I know that saved us well over $200,000 after talking to some neighboring districts who did not have their energy costs locked in. Everybody knows what your power bill has done at your house and what the delivery of that energy has cost as well as the actual energy itself. So you're you're dealing with a couple of different
010things. So our contract has has come up and our our rate has been about 7 cents a kilowatt hour for the past couple of years, which was great. Prior contract to that it was about 11 and 1/2 cents a kilowatt hour. Um we're we're getting a 36-month contract at 10 cents a kilowatt hour. It's locked in for the next 3 years. Uh I don't anticipate energy costs going down at all. And so, I think that savings will just be realized more and more as we move forward. If we were to just go with the current market rate right now with Ameren CIPS, uh it's a little over 11 cents a kilowatt hour, about 11 and 1/2 cents. So, um it's a it's a good thing for us to be able to lock these energy rates
011in and you know, we're good 10% below Ameren's rates currently. Uh I I think we're going to continue to see the benefit as we move forward. A a side piece of that that's not even included in this contract that was just signed is that once the solar array gets up behind the elementary school, the additional savings that will generate for our district in solar credits that we're able to purchase through the solar array at elementary. Um that's probably going to save us somewhere in the neighborhood of $50,000 more a year in energy cost. Um that's anticipated the first year. And again, that'll be a flat rate that solar will. And then, you know, as rates of energy cost just continue to escalate over the next 25 years, every year we should realize some more savings
012from those solar credits. So, um I'm probably going to have uh the solar guys come in and do a little bit more talking about what those rates look like and and how that works just for informational purposes. But, bottom line is we're locked in for 3 years on our energy costs and uh that rate's about 10 cents a kilowatt hour. So, that's what I wanted to share with the board tonight. We've We've got that contract signed already. Does Ameren ever do any educational grants? Educational grants as far as like for something in the classroom? >> Supportive of education in some way. Not that I know I know they're fairly uh good about community involvement and uh that's all. >> we just signed the contract, it'd be a good time to ask him, wouldn't it? That'll
013probably be the time. I'll do it. Any other questions or comments for Mr. Wilson? Okay. This time I need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to close the meeting in accordance with section 122A of the Open Meetings Act, citing the following exceptions as contained in section 122C to discuss student disciplinary matters, consider approval of closed minutes. I have something. Okay. I want to congratulate Mr. Harlow and the math team on their accomplishments today. So, I want to make sure we get that in our notes. Congratulations. We whipped up over to SIU today. So, do we need to allow Mr. Harlow an opportunity to brag? Mr. Harlow should probably brag. >> Okay, Mr. Harlow, would you like to brag on your students? Pretty much stopped What did you get? Yeah, we we take
014the largest team over there, which win or lose, that's always my pride point is because our team is the biggest one that goes to these contests. We brought um high school students and Mr. Lemons brought fifth grade sixth grade students too, so we were very well represented. Our freshman class placed first in the division. So did the junior class, so did the senior class. Sophomores placed second. Overall as a team in the medium-sized school division, we won the trophy. We got first. Had several individuals place in the top 10 in their grade levels. And when they do grade level placings, they don't do small school, large school, medium school. They just do everybody together. And we got several individuals placing as well, so it was really great. That's wonderful news. Yes, it is. So, in
015our next presentation of, you know, all of the different special things that the district has done. Okay. Mr. Wilson and I will make sure to pump you up, okay? You're welcome. Okay. Now, need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to close the meeting in accordance with section 122A of the Open Meetings Act, citing the following exceptions as contained in section 122C, to discuss student disciplinary matters, consider approval of closed minutes, to discuss the performance evaluation, and dismissal of specific employees, and to discuss litigation. So moved. Second. John Hutchinson? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Vote to reconvene to open session. So moved. Second. Cindy Miller? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Need
016a motion, a second, and roll call vote to expel student PC from Huron School District number 4 effective Tuesday, March 24th, 2026 through the end of the 2025-2026 school year and the 2026-2027 and 2027-2028 school years, during which time the student is not allowed on any Huron CUSD number 4 properties. So moved. Second. Kelly Green? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Need a motion, a second, and roll call vote to adopt the closed minutes from the meeting held February 24th, 2026. So moved. Second. Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. >> Susie Atherton? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. We need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the following personnel recommendations as presented for retirement, Elizabeth Annette
017Branch at the end of the 2025-2026 school year. Resignations, Meredith Thorbeck as a math teacher for the Hernando High School, Kenneth Joiner as a cook for the district, Stephanie Harrison as a teacher for the pre-K, Kelsey Henson as a paraprofessional for the junior high school. For employment, Nick Childress as a custodian for the district. Vacancies to be posted, cooks for the district, math teacher for the high school, coordinator family educator for the pre-K, teachers for the pre-K two in number, and paraprofessional for the junior high school. So moved. Second. Susie Atherton? Yes. Steve Robinson? >> Yes. >> Steve Young? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to approve the reemployment of all full-time tenured and non-tenured teachers for the 2026-2027 school year.
018So moved. Second. Steve Robinson? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. >> Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to grant tenure to the following teachers, Jessica Anderson, Holly Andrews, Sydney Apgar, Hannah Arview, Amy Bergman, Molly Childers, Megan Howerton, Angie Gillack, Hap Joliff, Hunter Lee, Steve Priest, and Madeline Seavers. So moved. Second. Susie Atherton? Yes. >> Steve Robinson? Yes. John Hutchinson? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Having completed the items on the agenda, I need a motion, a second, and a roll call vote to adjourn the meeting until the next scheduled meeting for Tuesday, April 28th, 2026 at 5:30 p.m. in the unit office conference room, 500 North 10th Street, Herrin, Illinois 62948. I move. I second. Don Hutchinson?
019Yes. Susie Atherton? Yes. Cindy Miller? Yes. Kelly Green? Yes. Steve Young? Yes. Steve Robinson? Yes. Thank you, everyone.