The High Desert Advocate talked to Mayor Daniel Corona, who just had his January Town Meeting on Tuesday the 24th, and he said that 13 people showed up to his community forum held at the library.
Mayor Corona: “We talked about a number of topics but the main focus on this meeting was education. I am meeting with Jeff Zander who is the superintendent of Elko County School District. I felt that for this month’s forum it would be best for me to receive input from community members on what they would like me to bring up with Mr Zander. We had a robust conversation that lasted a little over an hour and a half.
Among the biggest concerns was the “investment of 35 million dollars” that the superintendent and school board members continually say they have made in our community. The main concern about this is the math doesn’t add up and that amount spent and approve to spend so far only adds up to about $27 million. There are concerns that money that was earmarked to be spent in our community is actually going to be spent in Elko or Spring Creek. Some of the suggestions on how the county could spend the left over $8 million would be on improvements to the track and football field, as well as paving the roads down to the sports fields to make them ADA compliant so that our community members who are wheelchair bound can access them. There was also talk about the bleachers for the football field falling into disrepair and reaching a point to where they are no longer safe.
There was also a lot of talk about the middle school project and lack of input the county has received from teachers. Man of the community members present tonight feel that it is unacceptable that they school district is starting this project and completely shutting teachers out of the process. Teachers are still unsure whether or not they will have separate staff and elective courses or if they will have to walk their kids back and forth between the middle school and high school. If this is the case there were many tonight who don’t see the point in moving the middle school into a new building.
Many community members in attendance were also concerned about the lack of qualified teachers in our schools. The district needs to quit putting hiring new teachers for our schools off until the last minute and end this thinking of “a warm body is better than no body”. The children of our community deserve to have actual qualified teachers and not long term subs teaching classes for an entire school year.” Then he added:
“This of course is just a brief summary of the robust discussion that took place tonight.”
The comments of Mayor Corona needed answering by the party in question, mainly the Elko County School District. So the High Desert Advocate contacted Superintendent Jeff Zander, and forwarded him Mayor Corona’s comments.
To the Community of West Wendover:
Since the Town meeting was Tuesday night, we talked to Superintendent Jeff Zander Wednesday and he said to us that he was sorry but he would not be able to provide us with a full response the same day, due to the fact that he believed the Board should be able to review his full response prior to publication.
And he continued:
“I will share with you, I am personally am very disappointed with Mayor Corona for not waiting to verify his facts prior to submitting this article. Upon completion of the Middle School Remodel the Elko County Board of Trustee’s will have invested $35,659,908 in the New Elementary and Middle School Projects. West Wendover will have the newest and most expensive elementary, and the newest high school and middle school in the Elko County School District.
Regarding campus upgrades, the District spends a significant amount of money annually to upgrade facilities for the American Disability Act retrofits. In some years this allocation exceeds $1,000,000 dollars and it is based up the scope of the project and the age of the facility. Unfortunately, we do not have the resources available to address all of these needs in a short period of time and as a result this has been a long term effort. The WWHS is our newest high school so at this time it is last on the priority list. Football field bleachers, lights, concession stands and all weather tracks have never been funded through Pay as you Go or central office, those projects have always been a responsibility of the schools.
Regarding staff input, the District has never asked staff for input on remodel projects, nor do we inquire with staff regarding staffing allocations. Those decisions are determined from our Long Term Facility Plan and our District Staffing Allocation Guidelines. New schools are a handled differently requesting input from staff and the surrounding communities.
Regarding recruiting efforts, the District sent recruiting teams to 23 career fairs last year in which we hired 83 teachers. This process starts in January of each year and continues through the start of school. West Wendover and Owyhee are the only schools with a $10,000 dollar signing bonus for new teachers, which resulted from a decision by the Board of Trustee’s regarding the inability to recruit and retain teachers to those communities. The District feels they were very successful in the current market in recruiting high quality staff, and the Board of Trustee’s has made the recruitment and retention of high quality educators a number one priority in all of our communities”. He added that he will follow up with us with a complete response upon approval of the Board of Trustee’s.
