Last week the school board authorized staff to apply for funding under the Strategic Cybersecurity Pilot Program being rolled out by the Federal Communications Commission. The deadline is early November.
If accepted, Carlisle could have $200,000 for cybersecurity defense over the next three years, said Nathan Burgess, district director of technology. He compared the application process to writing a grant.
The pilot is a new program under FCC guidelines for E-Rate, which provides discounts to schools and libraries for such services as telecommunications, Internet access and internal connections.
"The hope is, after the pilot, they [the FCC] will roll it out to multiple districts and allow this service to be used on a regular basis," Burgess said. He said the only risk to the district is the almost $2,000 needed to process the application through its E-Rate service provider.
"If we get accepted, we get to move on to the next steps," Burgess said.
A security threat in early September 2023 prevented students from using the Internet during a school day. The shutdown also limited parent and visitor access to the schools and prompted the food service department to develop a workaround for student account information.
SUPERINTENDENT'S SALARY
In other business last week, the board raised the annual salary of Superintendent Colleen Friend to $180,000 for the 2024-25 fiscal year.
The raise was less than $2,000, Board President Paula Bussard said. "It's a modest market adjustment to assure that the board compensation practice is competitive within our geographic area. What we are trying to do in an era of superintendent shortages is to remain competitive, so we retain a highly qualified superintendent."
Friend is in the third year of her five-year contract with the school district. Her salary automatically increased on July 1 from $172,693 to $178,046. Aside from the additional salary increase, board members also formalized her evaluation and approved her goals for 2024-25.
The board determined that Friend exceeded expectations in the domains of Organization Leadership, Communications and Community Relations, Human Resource Management and Professionalism.
It determined that Friend met expectations in District Operations and Financial Management and Student Growth and Achievement. While there has been progress in those areas, the board believes there is always room for growth, Bussard said last week.
Friend provided the board with a first draft of her priorities, which were then modified and expanded based on their input. "It was a collaborative approach," Bussard said. "We are looking at goals that are measurable."
"This is a meaty list of goals," board member Bruce Clash said. "We feel that the administration is capable of taking on this much."
Goals for this year include a new comprehensive plan, a structural review of the district elementary schools and the McGowan building of Carlisle High School and the posting of a data dashboard of metrics on the district homepage that could include student demographics, graduation rates and attendance data.
The most extensive goal is a strategy to restructure grades K-8. This includes a proposal to construct a new 7-8 middle school and a recommendation by Friend to close the LeTort and Mount Holly Springs elementary schools.
BUDGET ADJUSTMENTS
Lastly, the board approved adjustments to the district's 2024-25 budget to account for higher than anticipated state revenue. The adjustments would increase total district revenue by $2,078,511 while adding $323,014 in expenses for the current school year.
Most of the money from the revenue adjustments will be used to offset what was projected to be a $1.3 million budget gap, said Clash, chairman of the board's finance committee. The original plan was to have the district use reserves to close the shortfall.
Instead, the district can save that money for future uses including expenses tied to the K-8 initiative, Clash said.
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