One withdraws from Neelyville School Board election

One candidate dropped out of the Neelyville R-IV school board election, bringing the number of candidates to nine.

When filing closed Jan. 20, 10 candidates had filed for three open seats that are currently held by Dean Fisher, Paul Petty and Shane Eaker.

Sharon Reece withdrew from the election.

The three incumbents will run for re-election. Justin Beaird, Bobby Burgett, Chuck Reinbott, Derek Emmons, Zach Shipman and Terry Wilkerson will join them on the ballot.

2020-21 schedule

The Neelyville board approved the schedule for the 2020-2021 school year.

The board received two different options with a variation on start date as the main difference.

The state requires 1,044 hours of instructional time and the approved calendar includes 1151.5 hours. This is a decrease in the number of hours students are in class compared to this year.

“I recommend we don’t cut anymore time out at this point because it’s already hard enough to get all of our skills in,” Parish said.

Teachers currently have two curriculum days, but those will be combined with the parent teacher conference days.

Superintendent Debra Parish recommended — and the board approved — a schedule where teachers return Aug. 19 and school starts on Aug. 24, which is a week later than the 2019 start date of Aug. 14.

“We scheduled both of these options based on what’s similar to our calendar for this year,” Parish said.

Parish said she recommended that schedule was based on responses from the teachers and staff with the district.

Under the approved schedule, students will be out of school Sept. 24 and 25. Tiger Fest will be Oct. 17 with no school the day before.

Nov. 13, will be the annual Veterans’ Day program with the following Monday and Tuesday closed for deer season.

Thanksgiving break will start Nov. 24 and last the rest of the week.

Christmas break will start Dec. 21 and end Jan. 4, 2021

Spring break will be the last week of March, the 29th through April 2, with fourth quarter midterm grades the week after.

The approved schedule has May 14 as the last day of school with early dismissal.

The board also set this year’s graduation as Saturday, May 9, at 6 p.m. The last day of school is May 6.

Illness

Parish also gave the board an update on the health of students with the current flu season.

The flu season starts in October, but has picked up in the past month. According to statistics on the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services website, there have been more cases statewide this season. As of Feb. 8, there have been 8,498 confirmed cases in the state. During that week, there were 1,161 cases in Southeast Missouri.

Parish said flu A, flu B, strep throat and stomach bug. At the lowest point in attendance, Hillview saw 77.8% attendance and had the lowest in the district. The district closed for Feb. 7 due to illness.

“Custodial staff worked hard to do some additional cleaning,” Parish said.

Since that day off, Parish said attendance has increased back to at least 90% for all campuses.

Bus bids

The district was approved for a grant through the Diesel Emmissions Reduction Act to go toward new buses. Parish said the grant is for $20,000, and the board approved putting out bids for the new bus.

Parish said they need to dispose of a bus that meets certain criteria and the new one has to meet others. She said the criteria are associated with the emissions of the bus.