A message from Superintendent Chris King - BVSD Update
Last week, the Boulder Valley Education Association signed a tentative agreement with the Boulder Valley School District. That agreement will be voted upon by the BVEA membership on August 17 and 18.

Unfortunately, BVEA has publicly urged their members to vote “No” on the tentative agreement which creates the strong possibility that BVSD will begin the 2009-2010 school year without a contract in place. If that is what occurs, we will operate under the terms of the current 2008-2009 contract which expires June 30 until a new agreement is achieved.

I would hope that individual teachers will carefully examine the district offer which manages to meet both our community and staff’s highest budget priority – maintaining classroom teacher ratios – while still managing to offer increases in health, dental, pension benefits and step increases plus a one percent stipend increase for 2009-2010.

It has become clear that it is this final point of the district’s offer of a stipend increase guaranteed for next year only versus the association’s counter offer of a cost of living adjustment, or COLA, permanently built into the BVSD salary base that is the major sticking point.

I understand teachers’ frustration with not being offered a COLA. Before I was an administrator, I was a teacher. I know the challenge of effectively delivering quality academic instruction day in and day out. As an administrator, I have learned the necessity of balancing compensation and educational program in a way that protects student learning as much as possible. I believe that this offer meets this public stewardship test in this very difficult economy. An association officer was quoted in the Camera as stating that this offer was the worst contract that she had seen in 20 years. I do not know if that is actually true. I do know that this is easily the weakest economy locally and statewide in well over 20 years. It has forced us to make some very difficult choices for the next fiscal year which begins July 1. For instance:

• While we were able to protect our community and staff’s highest priority – classroom teacher staffing ratios, we had to eliminate funding for some of our projects to address the social-emotional needs of our students, such as Freshmen Seminar, additional interventionist support and middle level advisory.
• We were also able to also maintain our staffing for support functions such as counselors, paraeducators and maintenance and custodial staff, but we had to cut funding for school bus replacement.
  
• And with the reorganization of the programs at the Technical Education Center and Arapahoe Ridge High School, we were able to recoup some clerical staff to improve the staffing ratios at our small elementary schools.
• The additional funding coming through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is delivering one-time dollars to provide additional professional development to support our special needs students and hire short-term instructional coaches. Both of these activities will build the base knowledge within our instructional staff to create greater student achievement in the future.

We offer a stipend versus the sought-after COLA because we have only one-time dollars to fund this increase next year. We also chose the stipend approach because every predictor for the following state fiscal year, 2010-2011, is for little or no increase in state K-12 funding in spite of expected increases in benefit and pension costs alone.

Because the fiscal year after that, 2011-2012, will see the end of the TABOR Amendment timeout known as Referendum C, the end of the “plus one percent” portion of Amendment 23, and the end of the current federal stimulus funding, we believe a COLA is unwise until additional revenue streams are found, the economy recovers or a combination of both.

With this bleak fiscal picture for the next three years, it is my intention to begin a community wide discussion this coming school year of internal and external BVSD stakeholders to examine the few increased funding options available to BVSD. Nothing less than the continued improvement of the academic excellence of this district is now on the line. In the meantime, I urge BVEA leaders and membership to think again and support in August what I believe is the best increase in compensation that we can offer at this time for next year.  

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Team BVSD wins Bolder Boulder Corporate Challenge
Teachers competed in category for corporations of 500 or more employees and placed first, fourth and eleventh.
Boulder Valley School District teachers defended their title this year by once again winning first place in the Bolder Boulder Corporate Challenge. BVSD’s teams competed in the category for corporations of 500 or more employees and placed first, fourth and eleventh. The top-ranked team clocked a total time of 03:44:46, beating the second place team from Sun Microsystems by almost 27 minutes and 58 seconds.

“Good job BVSD runners,” said Nicholas Cady, team organizer and a science/engineering teacher at Centaurus High School in Lafayette. “We defended our title!” Of particular note is that Fairview Teacher Josh Glaab was third overall in the citizen's race with a time of 31:01, which made him the top placing American in that race.

“On behalf of everyone at BVSD I want to say we are very proud of our teachers who entered the corporate challenge,” said Bob Jamieson, Benefits Director at BVSD. “They set a wonderful example for our organization of physical fitness and community spirit.”

BVSD entered three eight-person teams in the corporate challenge and also had a fourth team of three additional runners. The teams were made up of teachers from 11 different schools including all levels (elementary, middle and high). Following are the BVSD team members’ names, schools, and race finish times:

BVSD Team  1
Josh Glaab – 31:01– Fairview
Zach Crandall – 34:49– Southern Hills
Nick Cady – 34:53 - Centaurus
Eric Henson – 37:59 – Fairview
Bobby Lehman – 39:59 – Superior
Brian Matthews – 40:45 – Centaurus
Sandy Rea – 42:43 – Aspen Creek K-8
Rebekah Adams – 44:52 – Coal Creek
BVSD Team 2
Brian Huang -  41:56 - Centaurus
Owen Lunz – 41:59 – Centaurus
Steve Wozniak – 43:11 – Fairview
Brian Geraghty – 44:15 Aspen Creek
Kenny Leader – 44:55 – Monarch
Laurie Brockway – 45:16 – Bear Creek
Monika Bunting – 45:43 – Peak-2-Peak
Jason Henkhaus – 45:51 – Bear Creek
BVSD Team 3
Markham Carr – 46:30 - Centaurus
Kristen McLaurin – 46:46 – Monarch K-8
Jimmy Feeney – 46:57 – Bear Creek
Jay Stott – 47:21 – Fairview
Michael Flood – 48:48 – Fairview
Rebecca Feeney –49:51 –Fairview
Jen Moeller – 51:31 – Centaurus
Katie Konold – 53:02 – Aspen Creek
BVSD Team 4
Andy Hampton – Centaurus – 54:10
Kathy DiCarlo – 57:45 – Monarch
Kelly Herbert – 58:27 - Ryan Elem.
Sara Buchanan – 1:03:51 – Centaurus

The here for a full list of team results for the 2009 Bolder Boulder.

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2008-2009 Report Card
First, the good news. 2008-09, Impact on Education’s 25th anniversary year, was record setting. Thanks to our generous community, our fundraising yielded over $1.1 million for programs in BVSD that:

• Through the Opportunity Fund helped thousands of BVSD students to access fee-based classes, sports and other extracurricular activities and enrichment opportunities.
• Through Crayons to Calculators – a collaboration among six area non-profit organizations and managed by Impact on Education – provided backpacks of school supplies to 4,812 low income students in 92 schools in BVSD and St. Vrain school districts.
• Partnered with the University of Colorado to provide GAMES – Girls At the Museum Exploring Sciences, an after-school program to 4th and 5th grade girls from high-needs schools, providing them with hands-on science exploration and mentoring by female scientists.
• Through our Classroom Mini-Grants program, awarded 104 creative teachers with funds to organize hands-on classroom projects that bring the curriculum to life.  We also honored Laurie Brockway - Bear Creek Elementary; Devorah Dettloff - Arapahoe Ridge High School; Jeri Eurich - Crest View Elementary; Sue Kidder - Gold Hill Elementary and Bill Smith - Douglass Elementary with Impact Awards and recognized the five finalists as well as provided special acknowledgement awards to ten additional teachers.
• Held a 25th Anniversary Animation Contest, attracting over 3,500 students, sponsoring clubs at 13 high-needs schools and engaging students in learning 21st century multi-media technology.
• Partnered with BVSD Instructional Technology and teachers on Take My Teacher Home, an innovative, early remediation program that provides kindergarten students who start school with poor literacy skills with teacher-recorded lessons, songs, and activities loaded on an iPod Shuffle and an activity bag to allow them to extend their learning day at home, gaining grade-level proficiency.
• Partnered with Centaurus and Monarch High School math teachers on Algebra I Interventions, a pilot program that is exploring alternate teaching and learning approaches for students who enter high school under-prepared to succeed in Algebra and subsequent science and math courses. 

We also completed multi-year programs that provided students with field trips to the Fiske Planetarium or portable planetarium visits to schools and private music lessons for low-income middle school students. We disseminated inquiry-based, hands-on materials for 7th Grade Life Sciences classes; supported the OWL after-school program at Creekside Elementary; funded tutors for English Language Learners at Boulder and Centaurus High Schools and provided funds to BVSD for the school board community engagement process and to support the Healthy Foods initiative. 

Now, the bad news. Fundraising has fallen off 35 percent since December. Like the district and each of our individual families, Impact on Education must make hard choices to deal with this challenging economy. While last year’s surplus allows us to continue many of these programs in 2009-10, some must be cut. This week we held focus groups with teachers and, with their recommendation and support, will take a one-year hiatus from awarding Classroom Mini-Grants in order to allocate additional Opportunity Funds to help the increasing numbers of families that are struggling to afford public school related costs. We will also use the year to re-tool the Classroom Mini-Grants program to be less staff time intensive and to involve teachers more in supporting participation.

While the financial downturn poses great challenges for all of us, Impact on Education is honored to have the trust and support of community donors and to partner with BVSD staff and teachers to improve educational excellence, equity and innovation in our schools.

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Impact on Education Impact Award recipient profiles air on BV22
Five BVSD teachers were honored at a ceremony earlier this spring. The 2009 honorees are: Bear Creek Elementary Teacher Librarian Laurie Brockway, Arapahoe Campus ESL Teacher Devorah Dettloff, Crest View Elementary Special Education Teacher Jeri Eurich, Gold Hill Elementary K-2 Teacher Sue Kidder, and Douglass Elementary Third Grade Teacher Bill Smith. The honoree profiles air on Boulder Valley Educational TV Comcast channel 22 at the times listed below:

Monday: 8:00 p.m.
Tuesday: 9:00 a.m. and 7:30 p.m.
Wednesday: 8:30 a.m. and 7:00 p.m.
Thursday: 8:00 p.m.
Friday: 8:30 a.m. and 7:00 p.m.
Saturday: 11:30 a.m. and 8:00 p.m.
Sunday: 8:00 p.m.

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The Maintenance Safety Committee developed safety slogans to be used as reminders to co-workers to work safely. The committee then solicited the help of students in graphic arts to design posters based on the slogans. The students did a fantastic job in their designs and the committee could not have been more pleased!
Click on a poster to see even more designs!

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Under New Management

Kurt LeVasseur,  Director Career & Technical Education, effective July 1, 2009

Other Board Approvals

• The board authorized a contract award for construction services for the Summit gymnasium addition project to Palace Construction for $1,680,229.
• The district begins its fiscal year on July 1st and expends its budget on a relatively even scale over the 12 month period. However, the district receives a majority of its funding during the months of March through June, thereby creating a cash flow deficit in the first half of the fiscal year. To meet its cash flow needs, the board approved the staff recommended participation in the State of Colorado Interest-Free Loan Program.
• The K-5 Curriculum Essentials for Health, Language Arts, Mathematics, Science and Social Studies was adopted by the board. Find the K-5 Curriculum here.
• Recommended changes to the remaining Section D: Fiscal Management Policies and to move policies DEB/DEC/DFC Revenues from State/Federal Tax Sources to Policy Section K: School/Community Relations; and DFB Revenues from Licensing of School Facilities from Telecommunication Uses to Policy Section F: Facilities Development were approved by the board.
• The board approved school requests for new fees and adjustments to existing fees for the 2009-10 school year.
• The board ratified a Tentative Agreement/Memorandum of Understanding with BVEA extending the current BVEA BVSD agreement through August 31, 2009, to allow the BVEA members to vote on the tentative agreement for a new contract that was signed by both parties on June 2, 2009.

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Hats Off! Congratulations to this week's Superintendent's Honor Roll recipients:
During the June 9 board meeting, three spring state champions were honored as well as representatives of the Bear Creek Elementary School community who were recently recognized nationally for their commitment to achieving a car-free school community:

Kelsey Lakowske of Boulder High School, was crowned the 5A State Champion in the 3200m run at the State meet. Kelsey was ranked in the top 10 in the 800, 1600, and 3200 meter runs as well as top 10 in her 4 x 800 relay going in to the State meet. She was part of the record setting 4 x 800 at the Boulder county championships and was on various other relays sprint medley and 4 x 400 during the season.

Trent Ireland of Broomfield High School took the 4A state title in the 100 meter dash at the State Track & Field Championships on May 16, 2009.  He also took 3rd in state in both the 200 and 400 meter dashes.  Trent was the top scorer for the boys’ track and field state championship. 

Kelley Robinson of Nederland High School was crowned the 2A State Champion in the 1600 meter run at the State meet. Kelley also ran in the 4 x 800 and placed 2nd in state as a team member alongside her sister Kat.

In an exciting twist of nominations, Landon Hilliard, BVSD Transportation Department’s TO School Program nominated the Bear Creek Elementary School Car-Free Commute Team, while the Bear Creek group made up of Kent Cruger, Principal; Vivian Kennedy, Jim Kornish and Leo Radzihovsky, all Bear Creek parents, nominated Landon.

In nominating the Bear Creek group, Landon wrote that over the course of the past two school years, this principal and parent team has transformed Bear Creek students into a walking and cycling juggernaut through the implementation of the Car-Free Commute Program which aims to reduce car trips to school by promoting the “active transportation” of walking and cycling.

Fun, engaging activities such as the “Tour de French” and the “Cruger Cup Challenge” have spurred the entire Bear Creek school community – students, parents, and staff – to take up walking and cycling as regular transportation. Two successful days in fall 2008 and spring 2009 of “Zero-Cars in the Parking Lot” puts an exclamation point on the results. 

This spring, Bear Creek received the 2008 James L. Oberstar Award given annually to one Safe Routes to School program in the United States that demonstrates innovative techniques and sustainable practices that lead to more children walking and cycling to school. They received their award in Washington, D.C. directly from Congressman Oberstar on the occasion of the National Bike Summit.

Also during this trip, our own congressman, Jared Polis, met with the Bear Creek contingent, including three students, and submitted a statement into the Congressional Record. In part it reads: “The Bear Creek program has developed innovative transportation initiatives and taken a responsible, thoughtful, and creative approach to caring for the health and environment of its students and I join Chairman Oberstar in providing my support of their achievements.”

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