FARMINGTON -- Farmington School Board on Jan. 23 unanimously voted to extend the three-year contract for Superintendent Jon Laffoon another year through June 30, 2026.
Board president Travis Warren said the board met in executive session for about 45 minutes for Laffoon's annual evaluation.
The board opted to approve Laffoon's contract without any changes in his salary at this point. Warren said Laffoon's pay for 2022-23 is $145,900.
"We opted not to bring it up until we see what our legislators are going to do with teacher salaries and what they are going to do with education," Warren said, noting there are a lot of unknowns in education now with a new governor. "We're not sure what money we'll need to spend with any changes."
Warren said Laffoon received an excellent evaluation in most cases, with an adequate evaluation in all cases.
Some of the goals discussed with Laffoon, Warren said, were to continue to "tell the Farmington story." Farmington School District is in a good position and "we still would like for people to know how proud we are of our progress, academically and athletically," Warren said.
The board asked Laffoon to continue to foster good relationships with teachers and administrative staff, continue planning for growth in the district and also to train for a succession plan for positions of importance, in case that is needed for one reason or another, Warren said.
Laffoon opened the meeting expressing his appreciation for the board of directors. January is School Board Recognition Month in Arkansas. The high school's TV crew produced a video with students and teachers thanking the board for its service to the school district and this was shown at the meeting, held at Lynch Middle School.
"The board in Farmington is committed to positively impacting our students, from building all our new facilities to making sure we have resources in our classrooms and supporting our proposed preK program for next school year," Laffoon said.
He handed out certificates of appreciation to each board member from the Arkansas School Boards Association.
Middle school principal Julia Williams and some of her staff and students gave presentations on what's going on in the school building.
The school is implementing a program called "Capturing Kids' Hearts," which is a program to positively affirm all students and staff in different ways.
Williams said her students wanted to do the same for school board members and all 600 students wrote short notes of affirmation to the board members. These were handed to them at the meeting and a few read out loud.
Some of these notes said:
-- "Thank you for setting goals for the community."
-- "Thank you for keeping us safe and feeding us good food."
-- "We appreciate your service. Thank you for all the fun field trips."
-- "Thank you for all the supplies."
-- "Thank you for all the new buses. I love them. You all are the best."
In other news, the board approved the proposed 2024-2025 school budget, as required by the state. One note for the budget, Laffoon said, is that the county will have a millage rollback and this will reduce the district's revenue from property taxes about $80,000 annually.
The board approved their completed training hours report. Each member is required to have six hours in professional development each year but the report showed each had more than 20 hours for the calendar year.
Laffoon pointed out not many school boards have members with more than 20 hours of training when the minimum required is six hours.
"It shows the dedication, that our board members want to know what's best overall for our district," Laffoon said.
For the superintendent's report, Laffoon said student enrollment was 2,692, as of Jan. 17.
Laffoon also reported that the facilities division with the Arkansas Department of Education has released a memo showing a change in the International Building Code. In layman's terms, Laffoon said, the change says that if the district builds a new facility for more than 50 people, it will be required to include a safe room that matches the occupancy of the building.
Laffoon said a safe room would be at the district's expense and is an example of a new unfunded mandate.
"I'm not sure how we're going to do that but we'll figure that out as those pieces come," Laffoon said.
Warren then encouraged board members and those at the meeting to contact their legislators and ask that the state provide funding to meet the new building code.
In other news, Laffoon said the district has received a $227,000 grant for new Chromebooks from the Emergency Connectivity Fund and district staff are considering expansion of the alternative learning program to include 6th-9th grades next year. If approved, this would be in partnership with the state.
Laffoon