Teacher pay raise will impact Alva district $820,000

Superintendent Steve Parkhurst told the Alva School Board Monday night that because the Alva district is "off the state formula," the general fund will have to supply $820,000 to fund the pay increases voted by the State Legislature two weeks ago.

Alva, like most northwest Oklahoma school districts, receives more funds from county tax collections than the average school district in the state because the local assessor has lots of expensive oilfield equipment to assess. Two-thirds the districts in the state do not have such a bonus. Other Woods County school districts such as Freedom and Waynoka, and Alfalfa county schools are impacted in the same way as Alva.

As a result, the pay-increase costs for off-the-formula districts will not be helped by the tax increases voted by the legislature to pay for the teacher pay raises.

Parkhurst said that because the Alva district has been relatively frugal, the total monies in investments stand at $12,395,313.46. For the past couple of years, the Alva district has paid their employees a $2,500 stipend for accomplishing certain training goals. This means the difference the district will have to come up with will not be $6,100, but rather $6,100 minus $2,500, for an increase of $3,600. There is also the risk the state could change their "formula." One other fear is some legislators would like to move the gross-production revenue into a statewide pot, rather than county by county, which would not be good news for northwest Oklahoma school districts.

Buddy Carroll Auditor

The board received their annual audit report from auditor Buddy Carroll. He said the audit firm reviewed prior-year recommendations and the district had made the proper corrections. One employee had been paid $61 too much in a bookkeeping error, and a need for fundraising sponsors to turn in their money quickly had been achieved. Also, three signatures instead of one were required on fundraising accounting and this was done.

The district did get "gigged" with one material accounting error. This had to do with the handling of funds to complete the practice facility construction project. The foundation and the district had agreed to pay for some finishing-up expenses before the money had been encumbered. The superintendent was required to write a letter describing what steps have been taken to keep such an error from occurring in the future.

Personnel Changes

The board agreed to hire Dalton Beeler, a certified teacher on a one-year temporary contract. Beeler has been with the Woodward Public Schools for the past three years. He handled special education at Woodward High School and is a native of Alva.

The board accepted a letter of retirement from math teacher Brian Smithey. He has suffered many health problems and said he cannot teach next year.

Cherri Pfleider turned in a retirement resignation from her job at Lincoln School effective May 24, 2018.

Another resignation was submitted by Mike Claflin who teaches at Alva High School. He will move on to teaching special ed at Pond-Creek-Hunter.

Kandee Almgren, president of the Alva Education Association, provided written notice to the board that the teachers union would like to enter into win-win negotiations for the 2018-19 school year. Superintendent Parkhurst said this is an annual first step for teachers and administrators to place their goals on the negotiating table.

A request from the second-grade teachers (Mrs. Cushenbery, Mrs. Kennedy, Mrs. Maharry and Mrs. Olive) at Longfellow School was approved to take their students to the Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita, Kansas, on April 27.

High school girls' basketball coach Dusty Horn asked for and received permission to use a school Suburban on April 10 to take a few girls to Nebraska to watch and support former Ladybugs basketball and softball player Ally Riley. He mentioned in his request that in the past he has taken students to watch Jaden Hobbs, Bailey Forell and Whitney Randall. Horn also requested permission to take a vehicle on the weekend of April 13–15 for the Nike Basketball Coaches Clinic in Kansas City.