Barren County Board of Education met to hear reports from various faculty and staff on July 13. Photo by Michael Crimmins/Glasgow News 1
By MICHAEL CRIMMINS
Glasgow News 1
The Barren County Board of Education met in the district’s central office on Thursday, July 13. During the roughly hour-long meeting, numerous items were approved and brought to the attention of board members, including the district’s strategic plan to 2027 and the revision of the voting map for the members.
The meeting began with prayer by Superintendent Bo Matthews before moving into public comments, which there were none, and recognitions. Cortni Crews, assistant superintendent, said this month was “district month” where they would recognize people from all over the district rather than from one school.
According to the agenda, the student of the month was Jackson Maples, an intern at the district’s central office. The classified employee of the month was Mike Bragg, a custodian that has been with the district for more than 24 years. The certified employee of the month was Tyler Hensley, an Austin Tracy Elementary teacher who was recently named Junior Beta Sponsor of the Year.
After the recognition, after all the guests of the recognized had filed out, the board began its business with “Superintendent and Staff Recommendations and Reports.” After each faculty member gave their report on their respective area, the board moved to the agenda’s action items.
In the action items was the approval of the district’s strategic plan. The plan was presented by Deanna Ashby, a retired Kentucky superintendent who works with Stuber Education to come up with the plan for Barren County.
Ashby said, the creation of the plan began at the beginning of the year and involved diverse inputs from parents, students, teachers and board members.
“We launched the process in January of 2023, and we conducted focus groups. We had a focus group of the parents, representation of certified staff, classified staff, students, middle and high school, and with community leaders and business partners, the Board of Education and an administrative team.” Ashby said.
The goal of the strategic plan is to provide a comprehensive path for the district going forward, a “what does success look like” metric in the words of Ashby.
“Not every district has a strategic plan but Barren County, along with quite a few others, felt that it was very important for the strategic plan that begins with the Board of Education and is blessed by them is launched to help give them a plan to address [issues] and how they move forward,” Ashby said.
The board approved the strategic plan through unanimous vote.
Next under action items was the approval of the “BITS change in Boundary Lines of Division.” According to Stephanie Spence, administrative assistant to Bo Matthews, this was done in an effort to equalize the number of voters in each member’s district. She emphasized this was not a reorganizing of the district, but rather a reorganizing of voter population for Board of Education positions.
She said, the new map is not hugely different from the current map with only a few neighborhoods being affected.
All other items were approved unanimously by board members with little discussion.
The next board meeting was moved to Aug. 8 in hopes of getting to view a currently underway construction project at the high school.
Comments