by Dave DeMars
news@thenewsleaders.com
The Sauk Rapids-Rice Independent School District 47 has just concluded the 2016 fiscal year as of June 30 of this year and is now about two months into the new 2017 fiscal year. It’s also the beginning of a new school year with school actively commencing shortly after Labor Day.
With the two different beginnings for the school district, the Newsleader decided it might be the right time to review some past performance and to look ahead for what the future might hold for ISD 47. We were able to contact ISD 47 Superintendent Dr. Dan Bittman in a phone interview for his assessments as to the state of ISD 47. The following is an edited version of that conversation.
It’s important to understand Bittman is a strong believer in education and the power of education to effect change on both a personal and a societal level. This is Bittman’s seventh year with ISD 47. Previously he worked in the Minnesota Department of Education, and as Director of Elementary and Secondary Schools in Centennial. Prior to that he was the director of elementary schools for Clark County in Las Vegas, the nation’s fifth-largest school district.
“I think education is critical for preparing our kids for what lies ahead after the K-12 experience,” Bittman said. “I believe those partnerships with our families and our businesses as well as K-12 educators are just crucial in what we do every single day.”
High points, low points
Newsleader: What were some of the high points during the past year in ISD 47?
Bittman: We are really blessed in ISD 47 because we have an amazingly engaged community, we have school board members who are very much committed to doing great things for kids, our businesses have been really, really involved, and we continue to see great things happening in every school, both academically, emotionally, even with athletics and activities. So I feel blessed to be part of a wonderful district with amazing people. Our ACT scores (American College Testing) and other achievement scores in a number of different areas continue to grow as we continue to support kids. As we finished our initial implementation of one-to-one in terms of providing devices for students to access curriculum through technology. The school board was recognized nationally with two different awards, and this was the second year in a row they were recognized nationally for their great work.
We also conducted a facilities study the last two years to look at our needs. Between 75 and 100 community members took part and worked throughout the year to make recommendations to the school board in terms of what the next 10 years should look like from a facilities standpoint. We asked difficult questions and asked the community members to search through the information and data and to come up with recommendations for the board to consider.
Newsleader: Any low points or difficulties in the last year?
Bittman: You know what? Not really. In terms of difficulties, it’s always difficult to be sure you are meeting the needs of every child. We are in a difficult position in terms of space. We cannot continue to meet the needs, in terms of growth rate, of our district residents. So even our district resident rate is growing faster than what our district can handle. That is why our facilities study was so important – to figure out how we can plan for the next three or four years as well as the next 10 to 15 years. That was the real challenge.
The need to build
Newsleader: We are at the start of a new fiscal year now. What kinds of changes do you look forward to or can you foresee in terms of new programs, new buildings?
Bittman: This year will be exciting because the school board continues to focus on ways to lower classroom sizes. They agreed to add several positions to provide more support for our families, so that’s exciting that we can continue to do that as the needs of our students and families increase. We recently received a $618,000 grant to specifically work with at-risk students. That will provide individual personal instruction for kids, so that will help a certain type of kid to better prepare for post-secondary and career success. We’ll also have listening sessions with our community in September, October and November to present the recommendation the community group put forward in terms of facilities so every community member has the information the task force submitted and has the opportunity to share what they like and what they don’t like.
Newsleader: There have been announcements that new schools are in the works. Pleasantview in particular has been mentioned as needing to be replaced. Can you speak to the issue of new buildings, and will new buildings make for better students?
Bittman: A couple of clarifications. The school board has not made any decisions regarding building. There is no new building or buildings being built. What has happened is that this spring, the community task force – the community members not the district – put forth recommendations for the board to consider. The board has now directed me as superintendent to do widespread community listening sessions in September, October and November to decide if they are going to do anything with those recommendations.
No decisions have been made about building. The school board, administration and myself would really like to learn from the community about what they would like this district to look like in the next 10 to 15 years. Concerning building, we have the state demographer come out and do projections and we got various organizations to evaluate the district as to its needs.
Every single one of them has said the district needs to have space for our resident students. If enrollment continues to grow like it is, there will not be any room. And that’s at the elementary level. The state demographer said we could expect up to a 17.3-percent increase, if not more, in the next five to 10 years.
If we do nothing, we will be in trouble in the elementary, but we would be OK in middle school and high school for the near future. No one I’ve talked to at any parent meeting says the space is not needed. The only discussion is how are we going to accommodate it. Based on feedback from the listening sessions, I will make recommendations to the board. More information can be found on the district website under the heading “Facility Study.”
Newsleader: Do you care to comment on teaching/staff relationships and negotiations?
Bittman: We are in between negotiation years right now. Actually our teachers have contracts through 2019, so we won’t negotiate until then. We have a really good relationship with our unions – all of them. The only group we will be negotiating with is the clerical unit. We try to operate and negotiate on a cycle.
Newsleader: Are the number of families choosing to home-school an item for concern? Nationwide more families are choosing to pursue that option.
Bittman: We are not concerned about the number of families that choose to home school. We think educational choices are up to the individual families, and our parents know best on how to meet their child’s needs. We believe in central Minnesota, all of our school districts provide great education. For some, home-schooling is a wonderful opportunity for them. If all of the home-school students and students who get schooled elsewhere would decide to enroll in the current school, we would have an even a more difficult time finding room for them. We are having a difficult time finding room as it is, space-wise.
Race, religious issues
Newsleader: Some schools in other cities have experienced issues in the areas of race and religion. Are there any issues resulting from race and religious issues in Sauk Rapids?
Bittman: There are not. We are a very different district than say St. Cloud in terms of demographics. We have no concern about that. We work really hard to make everyone who comes to Sauk Rapids-Rice feel comfortable and welcome in our schools. Biodiversity has been very beneficial to our schools and to the community.
School security
Newsleader: Does Sauk Rapids-Rice have any issues with school security, and what can be done to create a more comfortable environment?
Bittman: We are very lucky in Sauk Rapids and we work closely with local police on this matter. In addition, we have a local school security group who helps us to make sure we are meeting the needs and are most secure. This summer we did an assessment of our security in our buildings. We looked at the buildings, the practices and all of that to make sure we are doing things well and staying on top of it. We have a state-of-the-art system in place right now. We have cameras within the schools and work with Geocom on 3-D-type systems connecting us not only to the city but also with the county.
