Unit 40 Board Moves Forward on Little Lambs' Acquisition

Effingham Unit 40 school board members moved ahead Monday with the eventual acquisition of Little Lambs Early Childhood Center.

The Board is acquiring the facility as a way to attract potential employees who can leave their children while at work for the district.

Board members approved an asset purchase agreement, but also approved a consulting agreement with Little Lambs Director Carla Holtz, and approved a lease agreement with Tri-Bar Investments, which owns the building where Little Lambs is located. 

On last night's agenda, but tabled for now was a daycare management lease agreement with Little Lambs, and a multi-year employment contract with the early childhood director.

The Board also approved job descriptions for Unit 40 Early Childhood Center employees, and the hourly pay scale for those employees, effective July 1. 

Also Monday, the Unit 40 board extended the suspension of a student through the 2023-2024 school year, but tabled adjustments to non-certified, non-union contracts until a special meeting next week.

That special meeting will take place at 5:30pm on Wednesday, May 3. The meeting will also be held to swear in and seat the board members elected earlier this month. That includes incumbent members Jill Wendling and Jane Willenborg as well as newcomers Andrew Altman and Scott Volpi. 

That leaves an unexpired two-year term that no one filed for in the April election. Superintendent Andrew Johnson said the goal is to accept applications this week from those interested in the unexpired term with a goal of filling the vacancy at the meeting on the 3rd. 

The Board also approved emergency pay for those who have worked to deal with the network problems experienced by the district. A total of $16,282.77 is being paid to those individuals for the extra hours they put in. Board member Chad Thompson asked whether a cyber insurance coverage for the district has been finalized. Johnson said the coverage hasn't been finalized, but hopes it will be in place very soon. Thompson works on such agreements in his line of work and said it is a time-consuming process. 

The Board did approve catastrophic and voluntary student accident, which is offered at no cost to the district but is available to students to purchase. 

The Board also awarded a bid for a new asphalt surface on the parking lot at the Early Learning Center. Effingham Asphalt was awarded the work for $235,830. Meanwhile, a topic of discussion was a series of improvements to libraries in Unit 40 schools, an initiative of departing board member and president Robin Klosterman. The biggest project will take place at Effingham High School, with painting and flooring work this summer at a cost of up to $150,000 and work at South Side School at a cost of up to $50,000. Earmarked for Summer 2024 is a major renovation involving the library and the tech space at Central Grade School. Research continues on the best option at Central. 

In personnel action, the Unit 40 board hired Jill Feldhake as a Math teacher at the junior high school for the coming school year and hired Katie Hagen as a LBS1 teacher at South Side for the coming school year. These individuals were hired for summer school at the junior high Katie Breer, Stephanie Mitchell, Shayna Phillips and Erica McNeely. Hired as technology workers for the summer or for seasonal work were: Megan Adkins, Jason Eirhart, Katrina Eirhart, Miranda Fox, Taylor Greene, Jacob Hammer, Jared Hammer, Ty Morrissey, Weston Peno, and Andrew Donaldson. 

Also hired were Tammy Birch, Diane Claar, Nancy Moeller and Barb Mueller as summer bridge bus drivers; Lisa Campton as summer bridge bus aide; Diana Brown as summer bridge paraprofessional; Kim Knierim as ESY bus driver; Lana Adams as ESY bus aide; Becky Daugherty as ESY LBS1 teacher; Jenny Castillo as ESY Speech Language Pathologist; these individuals as ESY paraprofessionals: Nicole Whetstone, Amy Wernsing, Pam Freeman, Barbara Jamison, Heather Batson, and Courtney Mathews; these employees as transportation workers for summer or seasonal work: Laura Hodges, Wayne Mapes and Kellie Robertson; Jacob Weaver and Maddox Burner as summer and seasonal maintenance workers; Sidney Donaldson as fresh/soph basketball coach, and Mackenzie Walker as assistant high school volleyball coach.

Transfers were approved for April Hardiek as ESY paraprofessional and Rebekah Dial as six-hour food service worker at the high school. Leaves were approved for Heather Batson and Kathy Peters.

Resignations were approved for Abra Woomer as girls tennis co-head coach, Wyatt Jones as boys JV basketball coach, and Jarred Simmons who worked in maintenance and grounds.

Retirements were accepted from Lillie Stevens as bus aide, Sue Getz as a high school cook, Christi Elliott as a teacher, and Sharon Macklin as a secretary at Central, all at the end of this school year. Kathy Peters' retirement as head cook at the junior high and Rod Wiethop's retirement as a teacher at the end of the 2025-2026 school year were also accepted.