Surrounded by school districts which are struggling with finances and slashing budgets, one district, at least, has a hefty present from Santa to show off this week – or maybe that should be Uncle Sam.

Thursday, December 20, 2001

Surrounded by school districts which are struggling with finances and slashing budgets, one district, at least, has a hefty present from Santa to show off this week – or maybe that should be Uncle Sam.

The Alden-Conger School District received word this week that it has been awarded a $288,150 grant to help with repairs to the roof, exterior walls and windows of the older part of the school building.

The grant is from a federal program – a School Renovation, Individual Disability Education Act (IDEA) and Technology Grant – that is administered in Minnesota by the State Department of Children, Families and Learning, said Superintendent Rita Usselman.

This grant program is intentionally set up to support schools that don’t have funds of their own to carry out large scale renovations or repairs to school facilities. All grants require a 30 percent match in funding from the school district initiating the request. Alden-Conger had already set up a facilities fund, holding its share of the project cost.

The original request from Alden-Conger was for $500,000 to help with five projects in the old building: repair of the roof, new windows, three sets of new exterior doors for increased security, renovation of the locker room area, and tuckpointing of the walls in the elementary section of the building. The roof has some bad leaks, which are damaging classrooms and ceilings and causing a hazard during rainstorms. The windows seep water and are a source of drafts and heat loss.

Although the school has received confirmation of its award, the exact projects to be funded have not been identified by the Department of Children, Families and Learning. They had learned earlier that the locker room renovation would not be considered, so the school board wasn’t expecting the request to be fully funded.

With a total annual operating budget of just over $3 million, and per pupil expenditures held to $6,283 per school year, a grant of this size will make quite a splash, Usselman said.

&uot;It’s a windfall. Small districts like us don’t get these sorts of grants all that often,&uot; said Usselman.

In other news from the district, contract negotiations with teachers have ended with teachers receiving an average increase in salary benefits of 4.2 percent for the first year of the contract, and an average increase of 5.06 percent in the second year Contracts for teaching staff at Alden-Conger are negotiated every two years. Non-certified staff contract negotiations still are not completed.

One concern in the negotiations with teaching staff was over the health insurance benefits provided by the district. This year, for the first time, a clause was added to allow the contract to be reopened to discuss changes to health insurance coverage. This was put in place in case funding from the state or revenue from other sources turns out to be better than expected, said Usselman. Both parties must agree to reopen the contract before the clause can be activated.

The Alden-Conger School District is now also the number one school district in the state in terms of percentage and numbers of open-enrolled students. 141 students, or more than 30 percent of the kids in the classrooms at Alden-Conger, are enrolled from outside the district.