The Becker School Board met Monday for the first meeting of the new year. The meeting was organizational meeting with a few extra caveats.

The first order of business was to elect a chairperson, a vice chairperson, a clerk and a treasurer. Mark Swanson was nominated for chair and accepted. Connie Robinson was nominated for vice chair and was accepted and Ryan Obermoller was nominated as clerk and was accepted. Cindy Graham accepted to position of treasurer after being nominated and seconded.

Open Forum

Betsy Armstrong appeared before the board and given five minutes to speak. She mentioned Critical Race Theory (CRT) and suggested the school board be sure CRT is not taught in Becker schools. She mentioned she and her team will continue to investigate the movement of CRT and continue to report findings to the board.

Armstrong also touched on LGBTQ and the transgender issue as far as social standing and rights. She iterated how sensitive the subject is and the fear of lawsuits but recommended sound procedures be communicated to all teachers.

Committee Assignments

All committee assignments from last year’s assignments were validated and secured with the exception of Obermoller moving to take an open seat on Facilities while Graham would take Obermoller’s seat on the Activity Advisory Committee with Connie Robinson. Mark Swanson would move to take a seat on Community Education.

Girls Who Code

Nat Boyer and Karen Landsverk held a presentation on a new club they are organizing at Becker. It’s called, Girls Who Code Club.

Girls Who Code is a club for students to explore coding in a fun and friendly environment.

The gender gap in computing is getting worse each year. In 1995, 37% of computer scientists were women. Today, it’s only 24%. The percent will continue to decline if nothing is done, so the Girls Who Code club is being introduced. The biggest drop off of girls in computer science is between the ages of 13 and 17. 

The Girls Who Code clubs are on a mission to close the gender gap in new entry-level tech jobs by 2030.

Reports

A student representative appeared before the board to give an update on school activities and programs. She also gave a rundown of recent accomplishments of the Winter sports teams and their records.

Supt. Jeremy Schmidt gave his report which included a mention on how Becker school’s COVID-19 infections is very low. He said MN OSHA is set to approve the Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) in agreement with Federal OSHA standards.  All staff who are unvaccinated will be required to take a test each week and wear a face covering when around others.  The CDC also has reduced quarantine times from 10 days to five days with improving symptoms.

As far as strategic goals, Schmidt ran through all eight goals in his report and mentioned each is either in progress or on pace to reach its goal soon.

Consent Agenda

The Consent Agenda was set to be voted on but Aaron Jurek wanted to speak on Agenda list item 5H which recommended continuing with the Patriot Newspaper as the official district newspaper.

The item was removed from the Consent Agenda and discussed as a separate line item.

Jurek mentioned that he — as a school board member and a citizen of Becker — was extremely upset with a couple mistakes the Patriot Newspaper made over the last year’s coverage. However, Jurek said he was encouraged when Editor, Bill Morgan personally called him (and some others on the board) to apologize for the November error.

“This is a great hometown newspaper as they cover school activities and meetings and do well with coverage,” Jurek said. “Ninety-five percent of what they do is great for the school.”

Another board member chimed in by saying, “But they have to be accurate,”.

Jurek agreed with the statement but also pointed out how the newspaper did a good job reporting in its year-in-review edition. With that, Jurek said he wanted to be sure all knew he was in full support of the Patriot being the school’s newspaper.

Obermoller mentioned that he had a similar conversation with Morgan and said, “I told him we can forgive, but we can’t forget.”

“You’ve been put on notice.”

He went on to say he thinks it is definitely in the best interests of the school district and its students to continue supporting the local newspaper.

The item was motioned and seconded for approval.

Other Reports

The board talked about personnel, gifts, a first reading of the MSBA vaccination or testing masking policy, a second reading of  the family and medical leave policy and a parameters resolution for school building bonds in 2022.