State-of-the-art technology coming in under budget

New Kent School Board members are praising efforts by administrators who negotiated lower than anticipated costs for furniture and technology packages bound for the county’s new high school.

Best of all, when the building opens in September classrooms inside the $50 million structure will feature “high-end” technology as opposed to the more “affordable” packages school officials had expected to purchase.

“There’s no question in my mind we’ll be presenting you in August with a 21st century, pretty close to top of the line high school,” associate superintendent Rick Richardson told board members during their Monday night meeting.

Richardson, who along with schools’ technology specialist Phyllis Geron led the negotiation effort with potential vendors, said hardware and infrastructure has been upgraded “in ways we couldn’t have imagined six months ago.”

State-of-the-art Promethian Interactive Whiteboards are being placed in all of the school’s 81 classrooms. Originally, whiteboards were slated for only 13.

With the whiteboards come compatible speaker/sound systems in all classrooms. And there will be 12 sets of student response systems dubbed “Activote” that enable students to interact with whiteboard lessons. None were included in the original package.

Six months ago estimated furniture and technology expenditures came in at just over $732,000 and $1 million, respectively. Final costs are now pegged at almost $561,000 for furniture and just under $991,000 for technology.

“This is another example of New Kent schools stretching dollars as far as they will go,” board member Terri Lindsay said.

Schools’ finance director Ed Smith said not all furniture needs have been filled, but Richardson added that the bottom line cost adjustment should be minimal since there are no more “big ticket” purchases remaining.

Richardson said some technology wish list items, including laptop computers for all teachers, have been left out. Wireless, Geron said, adds a new level of security issues for schools.

“After two or three years and we get into the replacement cycle, maybe we can look at laptops for everyone,” Richardson said.

For now, $1,258,000 in what is labeled “designated projects funds” has been earmarked for the furniture/technology bill. The remaining $294,000 is expected to come from schools’ capital account, Richardson said.

In other business Monday night, the board:

–Voted 5-0 to change schools’ policy of issuing employee paychecks from once to twice a month effective July 1. Paydays will be the 15th and last day of each month. On dates that fall on weekends, payday will be the Friday before. Twelve-month employees will receive two checks starting in July. Teachers and 10-month employees will be paid once in July and August and begin receiving two checks in September.

–Learned that thanks to rising gasoline and diesel fuel prices, the school system has exceeded its fuel budget for the year by $100,000 as of April 30. Schools have spent $356,000 on fuel when only $256,000 was budgeted for the year.

–Learned that schools have been awarded start-up grant money for a New Kent Parent Resource Center for special education. The money will pay for resource books, manuals, and consumable materials and hiring a parent coordinator to work up to 20 hours a week to plan training sessions and activities and meet with parents of special needs kids. The center is expected to be ready when school starts in September, but could be open by Aug. 1.