The Twin Rivers R-X School District's wifi password distribution among teachers dominated the bulk of the discussion during the monthly board meeting Tuesday night.
Sharing the district's password with staff failed by a vote of 3-4, with Lewis, Dugger and Ashcraft-Fincher voting in favor of sharing the wifi password with teachers.
The password was shared last year, resulting in all three campuses being compromised. As a result, the password was limited to Technology Director Amanda Hequembourg, part-time assistant Jerry Stockton and school principals.
"We have secure items to protect," Superintendent Jeremy Siebert said. "We are not keeping the password as a power thing."
Hequembourg added if someone were to hack into her information, the wifi password could be changed, locking everyone in the district out. She added if this were to happen, it could take weeks to fix.
Items such as teachers' plans or tests could be accessed if the system were hacked and Hequembourg added the wifi password would be the first assist to obtaining that information.
"Everyone [staff] is already on the wifi and not trusting staff with the wifi password is ridiculous I think," said Board President Lee Lewis. Board member David Dugger agreed with Lewis, adding he believed not trusting a wifi password with staff who are trusted to teach their children was stupid.
If teachers in the district need the wifi password for a device, the password is entered by Hequembourg, Stockton or a building principal.
With three campuses to cover, the two technology coordinators are not always available at all times to enter the password, so vouchers are available at each building's office. The voucher will allow someone on the wifi as a guest with the prompt of asking for the voucher number as the password. Wifi access is then granted for 24 hours.
The vouchers are also available for media needing internet access during events.
Board member Roger Baxter asked if there were ever any instances where a teacher who did not have the password needed it to make a device of theirs work.
"Not to my knowledge," Hequembourg said.
She added students have not been able to access school computers because so many devices were on the network.
"The more people you have on, the slower it will go, so I worry about extra devices," she said.
Hequembourg said bandwidth was increased last year to help with the issue.
Board member Billy Watson, who works with internet and cable, said if the board were to question Hequembourg or the IT department, they needed to have all their facts straight and suggested a separate network for school purchased devices and personal devices.
Per the chain of command, issues are to be brought first to principals. If the issue is not resolved, it is brought before Siebert and lastly the board.
Siebert said he first heard about the wifi password issue from board members, so the chain of command was not followed in this instance.
Siebert said he would work with Hequembourg on looking to expand the bandwidth at the district.
The district also set its tax rate slightly higher this year due to lower assessment values.
According to Siebert, with lower assessment values, the tax rate can be set higher to keep operation revenues the same.
Some items coming out of the district's operation budget include mainly supplies, Siebert said, as well as repairs and maintenance.
Ashcraft-Fincher updated the board on the district's Back to School Fair, which was held earlier in the month.
Ashcraft-Fincher reported 590 students attended the fair, helping with nearly everything needed to begin a new school year.
"We out did ourselves once again," Ashcraft-Fincher said.
The board also discussed adding a heating and air conditioning unit to the baseball and softball building.
Siebert said the building is already insulated but a conclusion was never made about whether or not to add the heating/AC unit.
The board decided to try a unit that was replaced before spending the money on a new one.
"It's [the unit] in good shape so we are going to try it first and see how long it will last," Siebert said.
The final bills should be coming in soon to the district from the summer campus improvement projects, Siebert added.
"I'm hoping we will have about $20,000 left over from the funds," he said.
With the extra money, board members expressed they would like to see ceiling tiles replaced in the high school lobby and upgrades made at the restrooms in the C Building.
"I think our facilities look better than they have in years," Siebert said.
In other action:
* Substitute list: The substitute list was approved by the board and was reported the list continues to grow.
* Local Special Education Compliance Plan: The plan was approved based on state laws and regulations.
* Athletic handbook: The changes approved to the athletic handbook included the coaches meetings before the beginning of each sport.
During executive session, Harlan Goodman was hired as an aide at Qulin. At the high school, Judy Chaffin and Tanya Tidwell were hired as aides. Amber Lanshley and Beth Grayson were hired as aides at Fisk, while Linda Leone was hired as a cook.
Emily Ward was hired as the fall assistant softball coach and Kelly Westerfield was hired as the spring assistant softball coach.
The next Twin Rivers R-X Board of Education meeting will be at 7 p.m. Sept. 19 at the Central Office board room.