Superintendent introduces new director of business services, previews community engagement presentation and schedules closed session on negotiations

During the Jan. 6 meeting Superintendent (Speaker 1) introduced Dawn Veil as St. Francis Area Schools' new director of business services and said she is now a district employee, replacing prior contracted services.

The superintendent congratulated Nate Berg for completing 100 or more hours of MSBA-sponsored meetings and said Berg received the MSBA director’s award for that work. The superintendent also described a draft procedure related to contracting with public officers, which was prepared after consultation with legal counsel and is based on the state statutory reference noted in the agenda.

Speaker 1 announced a tentative special meeting for Feb. 4 for a presentation by the Community Engagement Task Force and noted the Hazel Reinhart demographic study will be posted to the district’s facilities management webpage. The superintendent stated there will be a closed session after the public meeting to discuss negotiations; no details were disclosed in public session.

Board members said they will review posted materials and asked for a future presentation on discipline-related data in February or March. The board also discussed improving livestream audio and captioning for public access; Speaker 2 said bids are being solicited to upgrade equipment.

The board scheduled a closed session for negotiations and did not take substantive negotiation actions in open session.