Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education
Meeting
August 27, 2012
Minutes
The Rowan-Salisbury Board of Education met on August 27, 2012 at 5:00 p.m. at the Long Street
Administrative Office with the following members present: Dr. Jim Emerson, Mrs. W. Jean Kennedy,
Mrs. Linda Freeze, Mr. Mike Caskey, Mrs. Kay Wright Norman, Mr. Bryce Beard, and Dr. Richard Miller.
Also present were Dr. Judy Grissom, Dr. Rebecca Smith, Mrs. Delores Morris, Mr. Gene Miller, Mr.
Nathan Currie, Attorney Mr. Don Sayers, and Mrs. Bonnie Holder, Clerk to the Board.
Call to Order / Roll Call
Dr. Emerson called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. Mrs. Freeze officiated the Pledge of Allegiance.
Dr. Miller shared an opening prayer to include prayers for two West Rowan High School students killed
earlier in the day in a car accident.
Adopt Agenda
**Mrs. Norman moved the adoption of the agenda as submitted. Mrs. Kennedy seconded.
Unanimously approved. (7:0)
Communication to the Board
Mrs. Louise Funderburk – a grandparent who was upset with the student transfer policy and that her
granddaughter, who she felt had extenuating circumstances, may not able to attend the high school
that she attended last year.
Ms. Dee Dee Wright – a citizen said she was very concerned about issues that have occurred since
1984. She stated that she had a packet of documents that had been given to her from various
employees and parents who felt they or others had been wronged by the school system. Ms. Wright
said she would share the documents with the Board or superintendent, if they requested to do so.
Celebrations
Celebrations were postponed out of respect for the West Rowan High School students mentioned
above.
Superintendent and Board Comments
Dr. Grissom she wanted to mention several things regarding of the first day of school. She said all of
the superintendent’s advisory team visited all of the schools for the opening day of school. Dr.
Grissom said that attendance is at 18,569. However, there is a staggered kindergarten and those
numbers will certainly go up by the fifth day. Dr. Grissom said there were six teacher vacancies, and
that four of those happened very recently.
Dr. Grissom reviewed information that was in a packet prepared for members of the Board.
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Dr. Emerson said he visited four schools and the bus garage today, and that everything seemed to be
running smoothly.
Consideration of the Consent Agenda
 BOE Minutes of July 30, 2012
 July 2012 Financial Summary
** Dr. Miller moved approval of the Consent Agenda as submitted. Mrs. Norman seconded.
Unanimously approved. (7:0)
Discussion Items
Rowan County Early College Field Trip
Principal Cindy Misenheimer explained that the trip had been taken for a couple years, and that this year
they have been chosen to place the wreath on the tomb of the unknown soldier. Dr. Misenheimer said
that the students would miss three school days.
**Mrs. Freeze moved to approve the field trip request for the 9th grade students to travel to Washington,
DC. Mr. Beard seconded. Unanimously approved. (7:0)
Presentation – Carson High School China Trip
Ms. Amie Williams introduced herself and student, Savannah Deal, to make a presentation about their
trip to China during the summer. A video was shown of their travels and was narrated by several
students who expressed their feelings about their experience.
Miss Savannah Deal spoke to the Board about her experience and stated that the trip was an
unforgettable and life changing trip for her.
Henderson Independent High School Update
Dr. Chris Vecchione and assistant principal, Mr. Rodney Smith, gave a presentation to the Board to
review the progress being made at Henderson with the $2.5 million grant that was awarded to
Henderson 2 years ago. Dr. Vecchione explained the grant was a three year contract that will run
out at the end of this school year.
Dr. Vecchione said that Henderson personnel spent many volunteer hours beautifying the school’s
exterior and interior over the summer.
Dr. Emerson asked how many students were enrolled for the start of this year. Dr. Vecchione said 48
are enrolled and 37 attended the first day of schools.
Mr. Beard asked Dr. Vecchione how many students that attended last year wanted to remain at
Henderson this year. Dr. Vecchione said that about 50% requested to return instead of going back to
their home school.
Dr. Grissom said that the biggest part of the grant was to change the climate and infrastructure of the
school, and the most important thing that has been made was a change in the administration and staff
at the school, and that would continue.
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Dr. Vecchione shared information on some of the upcoming plans. He said all students get a free
breakfast because of the child nutrition department’s work to obtain a grant to provide this program. Dr.
Vecchione said they are looking at the next big implementation at the school and that was to expand
their hands-on program, which is consumer science, to include a culinary program. Dr. Vecchione said
that all day students from Henderson will have the opportunity to enroll and any student in our system
could enroll in the program for night classes.
Common Core/Essential Standards Overview
Dr. Becky Smith distributed a packet that she said had several things from the past week and a calendar
of training dates, as well as samples that related to the Common Core and Essential Standards
curriculum. She said that training teachers had been going on over the past year.
Dr. Smith explained that the folder also had samples of curriculum maps from each grade level, and
these maps are available to the teachers as a hard copy or online.
Dr. Smith shared that this summer teachers and principals participated in training and also discussed the
expectations that would be expected this year. She said that now teachers across the district can work
together and share ideas for teaching. It will be very beneficial. Dr. Smith also said there will be
teaching at a higher level consistently across the district.
Dr. Emerson asked what has changed. Dr. Smith said that now the curriculum is K-12, the same ideas
and themes, but deeper. She said as the student go up the grade span, they will continue to get deeper
questions and teaching in each area. She said the students will use more thinking skills and reading
skills.
Dr. Smith thanked the teachers, principals and curriculum directors who have worked on this process.
Everyone had to work collaboratively to make this implementation happen.
Dr. Grissom said that at one of the high schools that she visited today, a US History teacher said he
threw out all of his past curriculum, so that he would not be tempted to use the old, but would embrace
the change.
Bostian Elementary Roof Replacement
Mr. Gene Miller reviewed the roof bids for the replacement at Bostian Elementary. There were five
bidders that attended the pre-bid. He said total cost for the project including engineering fees will be
$83,415 for the replacement. He said Radco from Mt. Holly was the low bid, and the work will take
approximately 60 days.
**Mr. Caskey moved to accept the bid from Radco at a cost of $83,415. Mr. Beard seconded.
Unanimously approved. (7:0)
2012-13 Annual Budget Resolution
Mrs. Trexler reviewed the 2012-2013 Budget Resolution. She noted that the resolution included a
breakdown by funds. She said the most questioned item in the resolution would be on the first page at
our local fund where it shows how we plan to balance our budget by proceeding to cut an additional 40
positions, as well as approximately a quarter million dollars in program cuts. Mrs. Trexler said that at the
meeting in the spring, the Board elected to use fund balance to prevent further cuts from being made,
which would be a little over $1 million and funding a one time employee bonus of 1%.
Mrs. Trexler said she had received a call from the county finance office because the Board of
Commissioners met after our Board presented the budget, and they voted that the $375,000 they had
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given to us in the past couple years with some flexibility must be used this year in a teacher supply
program. Mrs. Trexler stated that the last two years, we have used the money to fund eight teacher
positions. However, at this time, we have to consider how we are going to balance the $375,000 within
our budget in order to back that out from what we expected to do to initiate the classroom supply
money.
Dr. Grissom said she had a few options the Board could consider.
1. Cut eight teaching positions.
2. Cut the one-time bonus to ¾% and do the supply money, which would get us within the
$15,000. That was the original amount the Board had agreed to take from the fund balance.
3. Dip in the fund balance $375,000 more and move on.
Mrs. Trexler said that we were looking at maintaining $3 million after appropriating the $2.3 into next
year.
Dr. Emerson asked the Board if they wanted to have the county to administer the program, or have Mrs.
Trexler administer the program through her department.
Dr. Emerson said he wanted Mrs. Trexler to say which way the program should be administered. He
asked if it was going to take us employing another person to administer the program or how would we
do it. Mrs. Trexler said most recently when the program was in place, it was extended out to the schools
for the school finance secretary to manage, account, and report the program.
Dr. Miller said he believed that the commissioners were empowered to funding the system, not running
the system.
Dr. Grissom said the timing was not good to go back and remove eight teachers or to go back in the
budget to begin cutting things.
Dr. Miller said he feels the system is to be commended for the efforts they have made in these economic
times. The fact we have not had to cut employees is because of the good fiscal management we have
had in obtaining grants and a little local money. Mr. Miller said that $3 million of $180 million is not
being extravagant when we need to have funds for a catastrophe. He said it is not being good stewards
of the school system to totally deplete the fund balance.
Dr. Miller said he felt we should take the $375,000 from the fund balance. He said he would never
support taking away the 1% one-time bonus.
**Dr. Miller moved to take the $375,000 from the fund balance and maintain the 1% one-time bonus to
the employees. Mrs. Beard seconded.
Mr. Caskey said that he felt it was a misunderstanding of the county commissioners’ intention by our
Board.
Question was called. Unanimously approved. (7:0).
Mrs. Trexler read the resolution from the school system for the acceptance of the $375,000 and that the
school system will operate the program.
**Dr. Miller moved to approve the Special Appropriation Resolution. Mrs. Norman seconded.
Unanimously approved. (7:0)
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Dr. Grissom mentioned that we also have not cut instructional supply money to the schools throughout
the years that we have had budget cuts.
**Dr. Miller moved approval of the Annual Budget Resolution. Mrs. Norman seconded. Unanimously
approved. (7:0)
Communications to the Board – Dr. Emerson
Mrs. Brenda Peoples – expressed some concerns she had regarding certain members of the school
administrative staff. She said she felt some policies are not being followed properly.
Superintendent/Board Comments – Dr. Grissom
None
Closed Session
**Mrs. Kennedy made a motion to recess into Closed Session at 6:26 p.m. to consider personnel
action that involves an [officer] or [employee], or [prospective public officer or employee] of this
board. [NC Gen. Stat. #143-318.11(a)(6)], to prevent disclosure of information that is privileged or
confidential pursuant to state or federal law [NC Gen. Stat. 143-318.11(a)(1). Mrs. Norman seconded.
Unanimously approved. (7:0)
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
BOE Closed Session Minutes of July 30, 2012
August Personnel Report
The Board took a short recess.
Report of Closed Session
**Dr. Miller moved to approve the August Personnel Report. Mrs. Kennedy seconded. Unanimously
approved. (7:0)
Dr. Miller moved to extend the contract of Mr. Gene Miller until December 31, 2012. Mrs. Freeze
seconded. Unanimously approved. (7:0)
Announcements
9/3 - Labor Day Holiday (Schools and Offices Closed)
9/5 - BOE Personnel/Finance Sub-committee Mtg./3:00 p.m./ES
9/18 - NCSBA District Meeting/3:30 - 8:00 p.m./Carson High
9/19 - BOE Curriculum/Technology Sub-committee Mtg./12:00 noon/LS
9/22 - STEM Matters Event/9:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m./Horizons & Knox Middle
9/24 - BOE Meeting/5:00 p.m./LS
Adjournment
**Mrs. Freeze moved to adjourn at 7:18 p.m. Mr. Beard seconded. Unanimously approved. (7:0)
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Dr. Jim Emerson, Chairman
Dr. Judy S. Grissom, Ed. D., Secretary
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