By Marcia Barnes
Staff Writer
Before the doors closed and the Clay County Board of Education meeting began, a handful of smiling Hayesville Elementary School students who are part of the Busy Beans Program took orders for coffee and drinks from board members and attendees. Later, the drinks were delivered and were free of charge.
The Busy Beans Program is a school-based enterprise housed and manned by Hayesville Elementary School students and supervised by teachers and assistant teachers. Drinks and seasonal treats are ordered and delivered across the district by students who participate and enjoy on-the-job training this program has offered since 2017. Students and their teachers were applauded during the recognition segment of the meeting.
During the portion of the meeting requiring action from the board, Superintendent Melissa Godfrey presented the current physical and financial scenario of Clay County Schools’ Pre-K. Godfrey stated the goals of the N.C. Pre-K program and said that there are lots of areas that Pre-K focuses on besides academics.
“Approaches to play and learning, emotional and social development, health and physical development, language development and cognitive development,” Godfrey said are also goals.
“There are certain ways that you can qualify for Pre-K. The child must be four years old on or before Aug. 31 of the program year. The child that meets the age requirements is eligible for N.C. Pre-K, if the child is from a family whose gross income is at or below 75 percent of the state median income. Children of certain military families are also eligible without regard to income,” Godfrey said.
Godfrey said that in addition to those requirements, up to 20 percent of age eligible children enrolled who have documented risk factors can also qualify for N.C. Pre-K. There are 72 Pre-K slots and four classrooms of 18 children. The school can receive Pre-K funding for up to 52 slots. Godfrey said that they only filled 46 of those slots this year.
“Even if all 52 of those slots are filled, we are still offering at least 20 slots for which we receive no funding from the state,” Godfrey said. “The Pre-K program is being sustained at this time, but the funds being used to sustain the program will not always be there.”
Godfrey presented a slide showing a projected revenue of $590,358.47 and said that the largest part of that figure, $237,336 is given by N.C. Pre-K. Esser Funds which helped to fund Pre-K during the pandemic expired in Sept. 2024.
“We do collect a staff fee from our students that do not qualify for N.C. Pre-K of $50 for the school year. We take some of our Federal Title I dollars, we take it off the top of our Title I allotment, $91,000 comes from that. We have $18,000 that comes from a Federal Special Education Fund that goes to Pre-K. Our second largest source of funding for Pre-K is the state At-Risk Funds and those can be used in a variety of ways,” Godfrey said.
Transportation costs for Pre-K students are not covered by N.C. Pre-K and Godfrey said that salaries and benefits for four teachers and four teacher-assistants alone is more than the projected revenue and there is also the cost of substitutes. Godfrey said that the presentation of costs and question before the board whether or not to charge tuition for students not enrolled in N.C. Pre-K was in an effort to be proactive.
Godfrey said that she has a huge heart for Pre-K and wants to insure that it will continue to go forward. The board tabled a decision until the March meeting.
An annual audit presentation was reported by Alan Thompson of Thompson, Price, Scott and Adams and Co., and Thompson said that everything was in order.
Two new National Board Certified Teachers were recognized, Michelle Calascione and Felicia Mull.
The board approved budget amendments presented by Shelley Hollingsworth, Chief Financial Officer. In the State Public School Fund, there was a transfer of $7,905 of one unused Career and Technical Education Month of Employment. In the Local Current Expense Fund there was a transfer from Local Capital Outlay Appropriation, $45,124. There were two reductions in the Title I and Title II Federal Grants Fund. The Title I Elementary and Secondary Act 1965/Every Student Succeeds Act 2015 reduction was a -$1,342 and Title II Improving Teacher Quality reduction was -$914.
The next regular board meeting will be held at 6 p.m. Monday, March 24.