By Gary Ogle
gogle@wbcowqel.com
The Colonel Crawford Board of Education met Monday evening and honored some outstanding performances this school year before turning its attention to next year.
Intermediate School Principal April Bond handed out awards and recognized the top spellers from this year’s Intermediate School Spelling Bee. The young scholars honored were Macy Dicus who repeated as the school’s top speller and also competed at the Tri-County Spelling Bee; second-place finisher Hope Sharp; Jacob Barnes in third place; and Ethan Studer in fourth place.
In other business, school board members approved the 2016-2017 school calendar, the replacement and repair of the fence around the three youth baseball fields on the campus and new scoreboards for the high school gymnasium.
The first day of classes for students in the 2016-2017 school year will be Aug. 23 and the final day will be June 1. Christmas vacation will run from Dec. 21 through Jan. 2. The district will also have a spring break next year which will be April 10 through 14.
The schedule exceeds the state mandatory minimum for students in grades K through 6 and grades 6 through 12.
The Colonel Crawford Athletic Boosters promised at the February board meeting it would pick up the cost of installation of new high school gymnasium scoreboards if the school board would buy the boards. At Monday’s meeting the board voted unanimously to purchase the scoreboards at a cost of $13,712.
Athletics Director David Sheldon said, “The old boards are completely shot. They quit working entirely during our practice for the tournament run and parts aren’t available to fix them.”
The new scoreboards will include the player information wings at one end and will have LED lights. They will be installed over the summer prior to the start of volleyball.
Superintendent Todd Martin said much of the fence to be used in replacing the fences around the youth baseball fields will be the fence removed from the high school fields. The cost of putting the fence up, plus some new fence, is $4,300.
The district also has two new buses in the garage which will soon be put out on routes. Martin noted the district has purchased four new buses over the past three years to update its fleet.
Board member Norm Huber said the State Facilities Commission has agreed to re-open Colonel Crawford’s case regarding lost classroom space as part of closing out the district’s recent high school wing construction project. Huber said a response could come as soon as next month.
Martin said the district was able to save considerable money to destroy old records that had been in the basement of the old high school. Advanced Fiber Technology shredded the documents at no charge after district personnel took the records to AFT.
“It looks beautiful,” Martin joked about the basement. “As beautiful as a basement could look.”
Sheldon, the district’s AD, reminded board members that the Athletic Boosters Annual Reverse Raffle is scheduled for April 16 at the Fairgrounds Youth Building. Sheldon said he still had tickets available for the event.
Martin said the demolition of portions of the old high school is proceeding and soon there will be a pile of bricks from the structure to be made available for community keepsakes for those who want them.