Team Fort Osage met for the fifth time this year on May 17. Topics of discussion included the budget, Career Ladder, school safety, address change, and legislation (information provided below on each). Budget I will be proposing the FY 24 budget to the Board of Education at the June 13 meeting. The budget includes enhancements to salaries, health insurance, Career Ladder, and other expenditures of the District. Per my May 10 email to staff, the salary proposals I’m recommending are possible because of full state funding, the levy transfer, and the positive reassessment data. Certificated contracts and Classified letters of assurance, with the new salary and placement information, will be sent following board approval in June. If you have any questions you may contact the human resources department at 816-650-7004 or email Debbie Peterson at [email protected]. Career Ladder As you know, after board approval at the June meeting, Fort Osage will participate in Career Ladder for the next school year (2023-2024). A survey, sent out in April, gathered feedback from all certificated staff regarding the implementation of the Career Ladder program this school year. Based on the feedback we received, several revisions to the plan were created to allow staff ease in the completion of Career Ladder while also maintaining the positive impact on students. Some of the changes include combining the three categories into two: teacher preparation (up to 60% total hours), and student connections (no less than 40% total hours). Home/school activities are now in the student connections category. In addition, DESE has decided that participants can begin collecting Career Ladder hours in June. School Safety Fort Osage has hired five school protection specialists who are trained SROs for next year. We currently have two SROs in the district, one from the Jackson County Sheriff's Office and the other through a grant from Buckner Police Department. The five school protection specialists will be hired from a company called Strategos. Next year, the seven individuals will be placed throughout the district ensuring a significant presence from highly trained protection professionals. Strategos has engaged over 500 protection professionals all over the U.S. and other parts of the globe. Since 2002, Stategos has trained, consulted and protected over 250,000 corporate, government, school, law enforcement and military professionals in over 15 countries. Address Change During the summer of 2023, the District will be making a change to our district office mailing addresses. With the opening of the new District Office/Transportation/ Maintenance/Technology Building, comes additional space and more centralized staff to help with the delivery of packages. During the summer, we will be changing our central mailing address to 25102 E. US 24 Highway, Independence, MO 64058. While many of the necessary changes will take place at the District level, staff will need to change their delivery locations for any orders placed starting June 1, 2023. Legislation The end of the legislative session was Friday, May 12. Several bills impacting public education were closely monitored throughout the session. Holistically it was a good session for public education. HB 253 (open enrollment) never came to a vote thus did not pass. Separately, SB 75 (retirement system) passed allowing for a 2.55% multiplier after 32 years of service as well as expanding critical shortage to 4 years. Comments are closed.
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