In an effort to lower costs to their school district members of the Ar-We-Va School Board have been considering for months the option of partial grade sharing for high school students among four neighboring districts including Carroll, Denison, IKM-Manning, and East Sac. At their meeting on Wednesday night Board President Sara Skinner says members were split between the Carroll Community School District and IKM-Manning; especially when looking at financial numbers.
With 3 in favor of Carroll and 2 backing IKM-Manning Skinner, who favored Carroll, felt it wasn’t fair to automatically say “no” to IKM-Manning without first learning more in depth information about the district such as they did during joint meetings with Carroll and Denison.
The Ar-We-Va board hopes to learn more about IKM-Manning’s test scores, class offerings, enrollment numbers and, an important sticking point for Skinner, their long term viability as a district.
The real issue, she adds, lies with a lack of state funding for all of Iowa’s schools.
The Ar-We-Va board is working as quickly as possible to come to a more unified consensus before making a final decision which will be made at a future board meeting with time allotted for public input. The meeting’s date and time will be posted at the school and on its social media outlets. Pending their decision, Skinner does want to assure students and parents that no matter what district is ultimately chosen they have all agreed to work with Ar-We-Va students to get them into their requested classes for the 2016-2017 school year.
Follow this link for more information about the district’s plan to pursue partial grade sharing. For information on how to contact your local legislators follow these links for Representative Brian Best and Senator Mark Segebart.
