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District 58

Board approves contract with Educational Support Personnel SEE PAGE 3

SP ORTS

Shake-up

New conferences all over football landscape SEE PAGE 5

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LOCAL NEWS

Westmont Library hosts exotic animals show Flying Fox Conservation group excites crowd

BY RYAN OSTRY Bugle Staff

@RyanOstry_BR18 rostry@buglenewspapers.com When the state of Illinois is discussed, exotic animals aren’t necessarily what come to mind.

At the Westmont Library, however, it was.

A presentation about a conservation education based animal program that included animals that many have not seen before, much less heard about, were presented.

“It’s kind off just a reminder to everybody that these animals do exist on our planet,” said presenter Christine Gomoll. “We really want people to know that as hard as it is for us humans to exist, the animals have their own struggles as well.”

A Toucan, kinkajou raccoon, three banded armadillo, sloth, children’s python, African pancake tortoise and a lesser hedgehog tenrec were all animals that were discussed and were able to be held by the audience.

A Toucan, which are members of the Neotropical near passerine bird family Ramphastidae, are most closely related to the American barbets.

They are brightly marked and have large, often-colorful bills, and the family includes five genera and over forty different species.

The kinkajou raccoon lives an arboreal lifestyle where they evolved independently; they are not closely related to any other tree-dwelling mammal group.

These specific types of raccoons are native to Central America and South America, and this mostly frugivorous mammal is not an endangered species, though it is seldom seen by people because of its strict nocturnal habits.

The three-banded armadillo, which caused the most excitement from the kids in the audience, is an armadillo species endemic to Brazil, where it is known as tatu-bola.

It is one of only two species of armadillo that can roll into a ball, but unfortunately it has suffered a 30 percent decline in population in the last 10 years.

One of the more sedentary moving creatures at the Westmont Library that was presented was the sloth.

Sloths were described as spending most of their lives hanging upside down in the trees of the tropical rain-

forests of South America and Central America, and the six species are in two families: two-toed sloths and three-toed sloths.

When the audience heard the name python, an overwhelming amount of quick feet scattered to the back of the room to keep their distance from the well-known animal.

Unlike most pythons, this could be held, and even wrapped around someone’s neck as it was displayed.

The children’s python is a species of nonvenomous snake in the family Pythonidae, and the species is

named after John George Children.

It is a nocturnal species occurring in the northern half of Australia and generally found on the ground, although it often climbs trees.

The Pancake tortoise is a species of flat-shelled tortoise in the family Testudinidae. and the species is native to Tanzania and Kenya.

Its common name refers to the flat shape of its shell.

The final animal shown to the intrigued audience was the Lesser hedgehog tenrec.

This funny looking small creature

is a species of mammal in the family Tenrecidae.

It is the only species in the genus Echinops and is named in honor of Charles Telfair.

“The Flying Fox are animals we really focus on because their populations are being decimated,” Gomoll said. “It’s really not a good thing because they are regrowers of the rain forest.

“So they are really important, as the other animals are, but it’s always a good time showing the crowd animals they haven’t seen before.”

LOCAL NEWS

Board approves contract with Educational Support Personnel Joint announcement from the District 58 Board and DG Educational Support Personnel help secretaries and instructional assistants in the long run The Downers Grove Grade School District 58 Board of Education approved a new four-year collective bargaining agreement with the Downers Grove Educational Support Personnel (DGESP) association.

This new collective bargaining agreement happened during the board’s regular meeting following five months of negotiation sessions.

“This collective bargaining agreement provides a work contract for District 58’s secretaries and instructional assistants who belong in the Downers Grove Educational Support Personnel (DGESP) union,” said communications specialist Megan Hewitt.

The DGESP ratified the contract on June 6 with a unanimous vote.

The DGESP includes District 58’s full-time and part-time secretaries and instructional assistants who are a part of the new deal.

“Secretaries and instructional assistants are indispensable to our District 58 schools, and this contract validates the important work they do each and every day to educate and care for District 58 children,” Hewitt said.

“We hope this new contract will help retain our current secretaries and instructional assistants, while attracting a larger pool of qualified candidates to fill open positions within this group.”

Some of the aspects of the new deal are that more competitive starting salaries will be implemented, which they will increase each year of the contract

MORE INFO Some of the aspects of the new deal are that more competitive starting salaries will be implemented, which they will increase each year of the contract ($13.50, $14, $14.50 and $15 per hour), annual salary increases of six percent, three percent, three percent and 3.5 percent to retain the current high-quality employees, an increased contribution by the Board of Education toward instructional assistant health insurance premiums, as well as a secretarial health insurance cost shift with an increased contribution by secretaries that maintains their high level of benefits.

($13.50, $14, $14.50 and $15 per hour), annual salary increases of six percent, three percent, three percent and 3.5 percent to retain the current highquality employees, an increased contribution by the Board of Education toward instructional assistant health insurance premiums, as well as a secretarial health insurance cost shift with an increased contribution by sec-

retaries that maintains their high level of benefits.

“A team of DGESP employees and District 58 administrators spent five months negotiating this contract,” Hewitt said. “The previous DGESP contract was set to expire this year, so it was imperative to develop a new fair contract to ensure this valuable group of employees could continue to work

in our schools.”

Along with the new contract, it also will have DGESP participation on the newly-established District Health and Wellness Committee which the committee reviews and monitors the current status of the District’s health insurance coverage and examines possible cost containment options.

Employee retirement benefit retention was very popular in demand for the new contract, while it will protect the District from additional costs associated with Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund (IMRF) penalties.

A $50,000 life insurance benefit to all DGESP staff at no cost to the employee, increased opportunities for instructional assistants to participate in professional learning and collaboration activities and revisions to contract language in an effort to increase understanding of the various contract provisions concluded the new contract.

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CONFERENCE

CHANGES Many local football teams will find themselves in a new-look conference this season

BY DRAKE SKLEBA For the Bugle

@BugleNewspapers sweditor@buglenewspapers.com For 18 of the 21 Voyager Media Publications’ football squads this fall, some small and some not-so-small changes, have taken place.

With the exception of the West Suburban Conference Gold and Silver Division area members, Downers Grove South and Downers Grove North and Independent Westmont, all of the other area schools have had their conferences realigned, or have moved on to new conferences.

The former East Suburban Catholic Conference and members Benet Academy, Joliet Catholic Academy and Notre Dame will all have new looks.

Back in May, the East Suburban Catholic Conference and the 101-year old Chicago Catholic League, formed the new CCL/ESCC Football Conference.

The new conference has six, fourteam divisions, Blue, Green, White, Orange, Purple and Red. Thus, the schools will play three Division games to determine a Divisional champion.

Many of the six non-conference games, for each school, will be played among all CCL/ESCC members, as CCL/ESCC Crossovers.

Defending IHSA Class 5A State Champion, the CCL/ESCC White member, Joliet Catholic Academy, will open season, at the CCL/ESCC Blue’s St. Rita on August 30.

Notre Dame is in the CCL/ESCC Green Division and Benet Academy, is in the CCL/ESCC Orange Division In the Central Suburban League,

one small change has taken place.

Glenbrook North, moves to the CSL South and Niles North moves on to the CSL North in 2019-20 school year.

Maine East, Maine South and Niles West remain unchanged.

Lisle will move on to the new Illinois Central 8 Conference after many years in the Interstate 8. For the Lions, this fall, the name of their football conference has changed but their conference opponents, Wilmington, Coal City, Herscher, Reed-Custer, Peotone, Streator and Coal City all were part of the Interstate 8 Conference, last season.

The Southwest Prairie Conference welcomes in the Blackhawks of West Aurora and the Foxes of Yorkville.

The SPC will break down into two, six-team divisions, the SPC East and the SPC West.

The SPC East will be comprised of Joliet Central, Joliet West, Plainfield South, Plainfield Central, Plainfield East and Romeoville.

Plainfield North and Minooka will be part of the new SPC West.

For each of the 12 SPC schools, their first four, nonconference games, will be SPC crossover games, with four from the opposite division. The final five games of the season will be divisional games.

For Bolingbrook and Lockport, their SouthWest Suburban Conference, which had 13 football schools, in 2018, has now just an even 10.

With the departure of Thornton, Thornwood and Thornridge to the Southland Conference, the SWSC will have each school play seven SWSC games following two nonconference battles in Week 1 and 2.

FILE PHOTO

Benet and other members of the ESCC joined with the Chicago Catholic League to form a new conference this season.

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