SCHOLASTICS New Buffalo school board elects two new board members

BY FRANCESCA SAGALA

Members of the New Buffalo Area Schools

Board of Education elected two new members to the board at their Monday, May 8, meeting, after the resignation of Patricia Newton and Paul Keller.

Newton resigned from the board last month. Board members accepted the resignation of Keller at that night’s meeting.

Stephen Donnelly and Greg Vosberg will fill the unexpired terms left vacant by the two members until next November’s general election.

Other candidates were Ruth Breckinridge Church, Brian Dodge and Curtis Newton.

Donnelly said he grew up in New Buffalo and, after moving away for 15 years, has returned to the area with his wife and child, who’s in the second grade.

As an attorney who has practiced law for 12 years, Donnelly said he’s used to conflict resolution and “applying certain sets of facts to different policies or statutes or language or rules.”

With regards to issues facing the district, he’s concerned with children who struggle with substance abuse and he’s interested in seeing how the community can utilize its resources to “alleviate” some of it.

The teacher shortage is also a concern

“I think it’s very compelling that we now start to reach out to teachers here and everywhere to try to figure out what it is we can try to do to attract young teachers, ambitious teachers as well as retain those teachers we currently have,” he said.

Vosberg moved here from Chicago in 2020 with his wife and two children.

He’s the senior director of operations for AbbVie Pharmecueticals and oversees its learning and engagement functions so he has “quite a few learning and education programs, technological investment projects, etc. that I’m engaged in.”

Vosberg added that he has a “relentless need for difficult projects and I’m willing to take things on.”

He said he doesn’t have an “agenda” and would like to continue “what the district is doing.”

“I would consider myself to be a grown-up in the room when it comes to some of the debates happening across the country at this point and I’d like to bring some balance,” he said.

Middle school principal Dan Caudle gave an update on middle school happenings.

In terms of academic performance, the school’s summative growth rating is 96.3% and summative proficiency is 99%, with Caudle saying both ratings were through MI School Data.

The school was named one of the best middle schools through US News and World Report and a Reward School through the Michigan Department of Education. Niche.com has also rated it one of the best middle schools in the country.

Caudle said the school is “sitting in the top 3 to 4% when you look at our scores.”

“Bright spots” at the school are the students receiving student of the month awards, students participating in activities such as the geography team and quiz bowl as well as “mix-it-updays,” like the Fall Harvest and Winter Wonderland,” during which students were grouped together with students outside of their peer groups.

Regarding next school year, Caudle said he’s looking forward to the new bell schedule, which will give students “more opportunities to explore” in the afternoon. Teachers will be going through Guaranteed and Viable curriculum, a yearlong workshop with Berrien RESA that will look at “vertically aligning our standards;” improving RTI courses and welcoming new classes, such as a student media class, choir and performing arts.

Sgt. Russ Tillery, school resource officer (SRO) for the high school and Dept. Rick Edgerle, SRO for the elementary school, gave an update.

This year, the district was awarded $60,000 in a safety grant; Five Star Window Coatings will be at the district next week to place safety film on all the exterior doors in all three schools; the Emergency Operations Procedure Plan for the district was updated; Tillery and Edgerle rewrote the district’s reunification plan; they worked with the elementary school’s PTO to start to purchase emergency buckets and supplies for every classroom in the district for lock downs and night lock security devices on high school classroom doors and other ones in the district were installed.

Five Star has already installed safety film on some of the elementary school’s windows and will be installing it on all the entrances to the school district next week and then every window after that (which was made possible through the safety grant).

Board members approved employing Elliana Panepinto as kindergarten teacher, pending background approval. The registration for Adam Bowen to attend the MASA New Superintendent Leadership Academy was approved.

A trip to Washington D.C. in May 2024, for next year’s senior and junior class was approved.

Board members adopted the resolution for the 2023-2024 Proposed Regional Education Service Agency’s General Fund Operating Budget.

The following openings for School of Choice for the start of 2023-2024 were approved: third grade: five; sixth grade, five; seventh grade, five; eighth grade, five; ninth grade, five and 10th grade, five.

Board members convened into Closed Session to conduct a superintendent periodic evaluation.

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