SPECIAL BOARD MEETING - Northland Pines School District

did not want the guaranteed prep minutes removed. Acklam asked that the Board does not cut the
mileage rate in half for the district’s traveling teachers, as part of her job is traveling between three
school buildings and she puts a lot of miles on her vehicle.
Mike Richie said as of right now the plan is to keep prep time the same but noted that if we have a
three or four million dollar shortfall due to a failed referendum then we may need to look at cutting
prep time in the future.
Annette Numrich expressed concern regarding any reduction in travel reimbursement. Numrich
indicated she gives up lunch time to travel to IEP meetings, never takes a break during the day,
never goes down to the lounge to take a break. Numrich said she is here by 7:00 a.m. every day to
prepare for her kids and be ready when they come in. Numrich feels it is an insult that teachers are
not considered to be already putting in their time.
Becky Boxrucker spoke regarding 7:30 to 3:30 workday, noting that she will get her kids to daycare
when they need to be and that is not the Board’s problem, but her concern is how the students are
taken care of during that time for 30 to 40 minutes before the school day begins; her kids in special
education can not go in to the lunch room in the morning and if they did, it would start out their day
horribly. Boxrucker noted she wishes she could punch a clock because the district would be paying
her a lot more money. Boxrucker was also concerned about kids missing at the end of the day if
teachers leave just five minutes after the kids; they are usually there beyond that and are going back
and forth with the bus drivers and secretaries to make sure all kids are accounted for and on their
buses or being transported home via family. Boxrucker asked that the Board please consider that
we need to have a very good plan for the kids in the morning if they are going to be here longer then
10 or 15 minutes without supervision and we also need a good plan for the end of the school day to
ensure that kids are safely transported home.
Ann Hewitt asked if the Board was going to put this employee handbook document out for the
public. Mike said at this point this is a draft and we will be working on it and changing it daily so it
will not go out to the public until it is in final form. Our goal is to make it as brief as possible and
concise.
Ann Hewitt said that it was hurtful that the Board did not want to negotiate the contract extension
for the teachers and she is already feeling unappreciated in many other ways. She is also
disappointed that the Board wanted to change the workday from 7:30 to 3:30 and hopes that we
reconsider the workday.
Mike Gerlach asked do we know what financial shape we are in? Margo Smith, Business Manager,
said we will have a much tighter budget because of the 5.5% per pupil reduction in revenue;
however, we didn’t get much funding from the state so we are in better shape than many other
districts she knows of that are making a 25% layoff in staff due to a huge funding cliff. Margo said
she is still putting together the budget and there are still many unknown factors that will affect the
budget. Gerlach said the teachers have already taken a hit and he is hoping the Board is not going
to use tools to take more away from the teachers.
Jim Mulleady noted that we are getting constantly changing information from the state and we will
not have the final numbers for a while.
John Sarama asked the other board members what the negotiation process was in the past, noting he
did not appreciate being chastised by teachers regarding negotiations when the Board did put in a
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