The beginning of another school year brings with it the renewal of the interlocal agreement between Callaway Public Schools and Arnold Public Schools for the South Loup sports program. That agreement was one of the items on the Callaway School Board agenda at their Aug. 8 meeting.

The cooperative effort between the two schools began in 2007, and resulted in the Callaway Bears and Arnold Cardinals joining forces to form the South Loup Bobcats. The coop has been very successful and positive for both schools, and is viewed as a positive experience. The Callaway Board unanimously approved the interlocal agreement for the 2022-23 school year.

The board also approved the appointment of Heath Birkel as the South Loup Athletic Director for the 2022-23 school year. The district will pay Birkel a salary of $8,000 for their share of the AD position.

Birkel told the board that the South Loup Coop Committee met on Aug. 4 and decided to keep admission prices to school events the same this year as last year. The committee did set the 2022 Homecoming date for Sept. 23 in Callaway. The game that day will be played at 2 p.m. and the dance is set for 7 - 11 p.m.

“It has been really nice having Heath as our AD. He has been up here since the end of June just getting stuff cleaned up and taken care of and getting in contact with other schools,” said Callaway Superintendent Bryon Hanson.

Hanson also discussed the transportation schedule for this year, and explained that the district will begin with four routes which he plans to review at the end of the quarter. “We will keep track of ridership, and at the end of the quarter we will review that and we may condense that down to three,” said Hanson. “We do have quite a few people on there that are on ‘just in case’. So it could change.”

The school had budgeted for the purchase of a replacement vehicle this year, but with the availability of vehicles currently Hanson said he isn’t sure if that will happen. “We have three big vans, and our minivan. Right now we are going to hold off on purchasing, but I’m going to keep looking for a good deal,” he added. “I’ll be honest, I do think we are in pretty good shape with buses. I do think once we get toward the end of the grant program we are going to need to sit down and take a look and decide if we need to purchase a new bus. New bus prices have gone through the roof.”

Hanson also gave an update on the new boiler project. “We hit our first snag, but we are still going to get done in time. We had two, sometimes three people working here all summer,” he said.

The board did receive some good news, which Hanson was happy to deliver. The district has been awarded a $230,000 Beyond Bells Academic Grant. “The grant is designed to provide programming outside the regular school day to meet the needs of kids where we might have learning gaps. We sat down and started looking at how we can make that work for us, and we have the ability for K-12 to look at some afterschool programming,” said Hanson.

He said these funds will allow the school to purchase educational materials that can be used during the summer and in afterschool programs, which can also be used in the classrooms. The district could also see a benefit of being able to reallocate some ESSER II funds by using the Beyond Bells grant, which would then free up some of those ESSER funds for other things such as building and grounds. The board also approved the substitute teacher pay rate of $126 per day for the 2022-23 school year, and approved the South Loup handbook. After approving a new grading scale at the last meeting, a motion was unanimously approved at the Aug. 8 meeting to make the new grading scale retroactive to include the graduating classes of 2023, 2024 and 2025. The board will hold a special meeting on Friday, Aug. 26 to pay end of fiscal year bills and conduct a budget workshop. The September board meeting, which will include policy hearings and the budget and tax levy hearings, will be held on Sept. 12 beginning at 7:25 p.m.