Various Cuba R-2 School District administrators, board members and staff expressed excitement for the new school year and applauded the recent renovations on campus during the Aug. 19 meeting.

“Our building looks amazing,” said Cuba Elementary School Principal Tess Green. “I need to give all the props to maintenance and custodial staff. We were able to replace two big sections of our hallways with the paw prints. Next summer we’ll knock out two more sections. But the gold and black paw prints on the floor are replaced in some of those areas, and they look really nice. Our floors are shiny. Walls have been getting touched up with paint this week, so we do appreciate our maintenance and custodian for all their work there,” Green added.

Green also applauded the recent work done to expand Cuba Elementary School’s playground and said that the new surface has better drainage than before.

“In all angles of the playground, the drainage is amazing. I went out when it was pouring rain and was yelling ‘It’s working. It’s working,’ she said.

Matt Nigh, senior project manager at Navigate Building Solutions added that recent heavy rain in the area has provided a great opportunity to monitor the drainage of the new surface before school begins.

“I think the good thing about the rain is it shows just how good the drainage is,” Nigh said. “It’s been handling all this rain. They did add a lot of underdrain tile to that area, and then they covered the main great drain. I think all they have to do now is they have some seams they still have to sew back together and then spread their sand and so all that’s all those bags of sand sitting there. They’ll spread that.”

Green said that she has already been busy planning events for the elementary school such as Popsicles on the Playground, Grandparents Day and a block party. She noted that Sept. 10 is the Popsicles on the Playground event.

The school board also heard from its new Middle School Principal Erica Williamson and Special Education Director Karen Timmons, who shared what they have been working on leading up to the school year.

“Things are going great at the middle school,” Williamson said. “We all attended our tier one and tier two PBS (positive behavior support) training to get us all well-versed and ready for that. We’re kicking off this year with our Lego theme ‘building our future’, and we plan to welcome students back and have a great assembly Friday for them.”

“We’re excited for the new year,” Timmons said. “Mrs. McCaffrey and Tracy (Gianino) have been a huge help getting settled in, so I’m very thankful for them. Otherwise, our numbers are up a little bit from June, but that is because we transitioned our pre-K into our numbers, and numbers are changing because people are moving in and moving out, and that’ll just continue for the first few weeks until transfer records come in.” 

Cuba Elementary School kindergarten teacher Jeri Ann Herwig is the R-2 school district’s teacher representative for the school year and thanked the school board for the opportunity to share a teacher’s point of view at the board meetings.

“I just wanted to thank you for allowing this opportunity for me to be put on the agenda to share exciting and positive things happening in our district from a teacher’s perspective,” Herwig said.

Herwig added that many teachers, new and old, have come back with enthusiasm to start the new school year.

“With the start of school, we’re very excited to see new faces and old faces that come back and visit. Before the workshop days even started, there’s lots of lots of teachers, new teachers and old teachers coming back to get ready. Lots of enthusiasm, excitement, putting their classroom together, new themes and decorations.”

Students returned to campus Aug. 25 for the first day of school, and Herwig and the other administrators said that they will have more to report at the next meeting once school is back into the swing of things. 

Other school board news

Cuba R-2 School District Board Secretary Angela Jenkins announced that board member Caitlin Mace sent a letter of resignation on Aug. 5, which went into effect Aug. 7. Board president Jennifer Moreland said that an advertisement for the position, with submissions due back by ending at 4 p.m. on Sept. 8, will run in the Cuba Free Press for two weeks. Moreland added that the cabinet of herself, Vice President Rodger Bridgeman Jr. and Treasurer Chris Bell will narrow down the candidates and will conduct a maximum of three interviews to fill the position. The cabinet will hold a special meeting to conduct the interviews and are hopeful that they will be able to add a new board member by Sept. 29, its next meeting.    

Prior to the school board meeting, the district held its annual tax rate hearing where Superintendent Scott Davidson presented assessed valuations and proposed rates, allowing time for citizens to comment on expected revenues and tax changes ahead of statutory setting deadlines.

After not receiving any questions from attending citizens, Davidson said that the total new revenue (operating funds only) is $125,816, which the district will receive this year. The new revenue from new construction and improvements is $111,978, the new revenue from reassessment is $13,838 and the percentage of new revenue from reassessment is 0.32 percent.

Davidson added, “Keeping that perspective, though, that is essentially just our increase in insurance premiums that we got this year. So it’s nice to get that bump. It’s already spent. So we also are able to operate on the tax levy of $2.75. Just got to remind the board, though, that is the state minimum operating tax levy there, but that still sustains us at the moment. And then our debt services, given with the bond of the $8.5 million bond, the 56 cent debt service will pay those as well. So we’re in a good place financially.”

The $2.75 operating levy and 56-cent debt service levy allows the district to collect a total of $3.31 per every $100 of assessed valuation on property taxes.