Board pushes tribe for fixes after unreliable internet at new Rosebud Elementary

Todd County School District 66-1 board members on an evening meeting pressed for a meeting with tribal leaders after repeated internet and phone outages at the new Rosebud Elementary School, saying the outages disrupt instruction and phone service during storms.

Board members heard a detailed update from Yancey and Richard George on wireless connectivity to the new school. Yancey said the connection uses a long wireless bridge from a tower near a Mormon church behind Soldier Hill to the new school’s bus garage and that the bridge has been “out of alignment” and sensitive to precipitation. "Anytime we get a little bit of snow, that thing goes offline," Yancey said, adding that since the district connected the site around Dec. 27 the new school had lost connectivity on five days out of the roughly 18-day period he referenced. He said the internet service itself has adequate speed when up, but the wireless link's signal strength is below the recommended threshold and causes frequent outages.

Board members said outages also cut phone service at the school during those episodes. "Everything goes off. No phones. No Internet," one board member said while discussing the effect on school operations.

Yancey said he has repeatedly contacted the tribal IT director, identified in the discussion as Santee Barrett, but had not received timely responses after initial installation. He raised concerns about whether the tribe has 24/7 on-call support and noted the tribe's holiday schedule had coincided with at least one multi-hour outage. "If something went down, what is their backup to ensure we have service so we're not letting kids out of school and having to make up unnecessary days?" he asked.

The board discussed alternatives and short-term fixes. Technology staff said the immediate need is to realign and tighten the wireless bridge, work that the equipment vendor can perform. They discussed Starlink as an option but said it presents limitations for upload capacity and handling many simultaneous users (such as testing or videoconferencing) and would require separate arrangements for telephone service. "Starlink has good download speed, but upload speed is slower; if you got, say, 100 kids testing, then it's just gonna log it down," a staff member said.

Board members agreed to invite the tribal president and vice president to meet with the school board, and requested the tribe bring its IT personnel. The board asked that the invitation be sent by certified letter to ensure receipt and said they would invite Yancey and Richard George to the meeting. A board member urged the district to pursue the meeting promptly so the district can secure reliable service for students and staff.

The discussion was framed as a direction to pursue a meeting and technical fixes; no formal contract award or procurement decision was recorded during the meeting. Board members also discussed that when the wireless link is working the building moves closer to completion on other punch-list items, and that an engineering report on the connectivity was expected to be available the following day.

The update was presented during the superintendent’s report portion of the agenda; the board discussed the item in open session and directed staff to set up the meeting with tribal leaders and IT personnel.

The board also recognized senior Ty Balandra for participating in a Native American All-Star game in Frisco, Texas, during the same meeting.