The Ball Chatham School Board on July 23 approved a change order to the CES parking‑lot project after contractors discovered the front portion of the lot had no foundational layer beneath the asphalt, and the board also formally named its annual threat‑assessment team, added five employees to the onboarding roster and recorded the termination of an employee in closed session.

The actions are intended to prepare the district for the upcoming school year, but the change order will require additional funds to complete work on the CES lot. The board did not specify the dollar amount of the additional funds during the update shared after the meeting.

Superintendent (name not specified) said the district found the problem when crews “peeled back the first 2 inches of the asphalt” and determined “the majority of the front lot did not have a foundation under it.” The board approved a change order to allow crews to complete the work before school starts.

The board also completed required annual compliance steps by naming a threat‑assessment team. The naming of that team was presented as a routine, annual item and was approved without further elaboration in the meeting summary provided by district staff.

In staffing actions, the board approved adding five employees who were not listed on the original meeting agenda so the new hires could complete onboarding before the start of school. The superintendent described the additions as intended to “make sure that we're as staffed as we possibly could be and give those people an opportunity to participate in their onboarding before school starts in just a few weeks.” The meeting record did not specify the positions or the funding sources for those hires.

The board’s consent agenda, described as the district’s usual finances and routine items, was adopted. In closed session the board reported two items: approval of minutes from prior meetings and the termination of an employee; no further details about the termination were provided in the public summary.

During the communication portion of the meeting the superintendent reviewed the district’s annual artificial‑intelligence plan and said, “Nothing changed in the plan from last year, but just exposing our new board members, and our community again to the philosophy behind our plan, which is to educate and not be punitive in that AI is here to stay.” The superintendent also gave a general update on the district’s strategic‑plan progress over the past two years, shared last year’s Five Essentials survey data, and reviewed bullying and discipline data from the prior school year.

Two community members spoke during the citizens’ opportunity to address agenda items, each raising concerns about one‑on‑one nursing care for a student in the district. The meeting summary did not record board action in response to those speakers.

Votes at a glance

• Approval of minutes from previous meetings (closed session): outcome—approved (details not specified).

• Termination of an employee (closed session): outcome—approved (details not specified).

• Adoption of consent agenda (routine finances and administrative items): outcome—approved (details not specified).

• Addition of five employees to the agenda for onboarding: outcome—approved (positions and funding not specified).

• Naming of annual threat‑assessment team (annual compliance item): outcome—approved (team membership not specified).

• Change order for CES parking‑lot project to address missing foundation under front lot: outcome—approved (additional funds approved; amount not specified).

The board’s public summary did not include motion language, individual mover/second information, or roll‑call vote tallies for the items above.

Looking ahead, the superintendent shared the district’s planned meeting dates for August. The summary provided at the meeting concluded there were no substantive changes to the district’s AI plan from the prior year and no immediate follow‑up actions recorded for the citizen requests about one‑on‑one nursing care.