Malta School Board Meeting Recap

At the final Malta School Board meeting of the regular school year, 2016, the board of trustees heard of and voted upon several items including the purchase of two new wrestling mats, a teacher's request for out of country travel in 2018 and the new lights being put up around the high school and middle school.

The Malta School Board of Trustees approved no more than $7,000 toward the purchase of new wrestling mats to be used at local wrestling functions in both the Old Gym and at the high school. The total cost of the mats is estimated to be just under $24,000 and the other two thirds of the cost will be covered by the school's tournament fund and by the Malta Athletic Fund. Estimates of the age of the old mats is at least 25-years.

New lights being installed in the school's foyer, the Mustang Corral and the lights for the gym have been shipped and are on the way to Malta. MEC Electrical is doing the work inside the school while Spencer Electric is installing exterior lights around the facility.

Malta Elementary Principal Theodore Schye informed the trustees that there were 35 students enrolled in early kindergarten registration for next year. He said the school's third grade students recently completed state mandated testing and all went well. In his last bit of news, Principal Schye said six teachers from the school will be attending MBI training and the school will be recognized with a Bronze Award in conjunction with the Montana Behavior Initiation Process.

Malta Middle School Principal Shawn Bleth informed the trustees the school will hold their Luncheon Awards Program on Tuesday, May 24 and the next day is the final day of the school year (students return to school on August 17.) He said the fifth grade parent meeting was recently held and he was happy with the event's attendance with 30 out of 41 parents showing up, up from 50-percent at last year's function.

High School Principal Scott King, during his activities report, praised the Malta students who recently went to the State Music competition in Billings (results are on pages 2B and 3B of this week's PCN.)

"We had a great group of kids and we had a great deal of success," he said. "Mr. Swingen and Mr. Engebretson are to be commended with what they are doing throughout the music program."

During the unfinished business portion of the night's meeting, 15 non-tenured teachers had their contract for the 2016-17 school year approved and six facility members were granted tenure.

"I'd really like to congratulate those teachers that got their tenure tonight," said Malta Schools Superintendent Kris Kuehn. "It's a big deal."

Those teachers are Tyler Hanson, Grant Messerly, Kelly Sjostrom, Coleen Costin , Kalli Reintjes and Ashly Pankratz.

Under new business, Pankratz, who teaches English at the high school, made request for out of country trip that would potentially take a group of students for a nine day trip to London in 2018. The students who would take the potential trip would need to raise funds to the tune of nearly $4,000. Pankratz stressed that the trip would be focused on education and learning – not a spring break type ordeal – and students would visit a myriad of places in England including the Globe Theatre, Shakespeare's Birthplace in Warwickshire and St. Paul's Cathedral. The board of trustees approved the request and made it clear no district funds would be given to the trip-goers.

During Superintendent Kuehn's report, he informed the board of trustees that he recently received letters of resignation from staff who are looking to retire at the end of this school year. The staff members – teacher Karen Sisco, head cook Becky Green and school secretary Karen Rosendahl, had a retirement party on Friday afternoon.

"Their contributions, not matter how verbose I could get, will always be understated in my opinion," Superintendent Kuehn said. "They made the school in the 12 years I have been here and they all certainly, been players here much longer then that. I am extremely happy for their retirement and we are very sad to see them work their last days."

Richard Lerma, sixth grade reading, and Gloria Parker, special education, also submitted letters of resignation. The school's administrators have started interviewing people for the openings and the school's secretary job has drawn many inquiries. The closing date for applications for that job is Friday, May 20 at 4 p.m.

Prior to the night's meeting, Greg Skiff was once again sworn in as a School Board Trustee and Doug Ost was also sworn in as the newest trustee, replacing Galen Curtis on the board.

Special guests at the meeting on Wednesday night were members of Malta Boy Scout Troop 1429. They were attending the meeting in order to observe community service. The Scouts have been helping around the community doing physical community service and their attendance at the school board meeting will help them meet the management side of their community service merit badges.