Whenever we were having a little struggle, one of us would say 'Tell us something good. So that became our motto.”

Board member Denise Hoffstatter

Public is welcome!

The next school board meeting for Stanley-Boyd is Monday, Feb. 24 at 7 p.m. in the high school library.

The once a year Wisconsin Association of School Boards (WASB) Convention. Happening from Jan. 22 to Jan. 24 at Milwaukee, the annual convention was attended by Stanley-Boyd Schools Board of Education members.
They even had a personal board motto: Tell me something good.
"Whenever we were having a little struggle, one of us would say 'Tell us something good,'" board member Denise Hoffstatter shared of the Convention. "So that became our motto."
Attended by school boards from across the state, the 2024 WASB Convention sought to give boards tools to work with as they strive to improve local education in their areas.
Reflecting first on the experience was Stanley-Boyd Schools Board Member Becky Peterson.
"I attended a session called Project 180 and it was three schools in Door County that had students collaborate to do like a student council except you know they called it Project 180," she said. "Students that collaborated from three different schools to focus on student wellness activities and they hold their meetings...It was fun listening to the kids be excited and the projects they were doing."
One such project was Suckers for Seatbelts, in which students would hand out suckers in the school parking lot for seeing good seat belt behavior.
A second, elaborated online, involved Sturgeon Bay High School (SBHS) sought to engage students in an AODA (Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse) prevention program via different levels that included pledge signing, meeting attendance, and peer mentors, and being a representative at county meetings. Activities in the program seeking to drive down drug and alcohol abuse include the fun and eye opening as well, with fun including county movie night and eye opening involving drug abuse awareness events.
Next to share on the WASB Convention was Stanley-Boyd School Board Member Ryan Lewallen.
"I went through several sessions," he said. "One was on hiring international teachers and kind of how that process works. Visas that you have to apply for and lots of schools are hiring international teachers so its something we might need to do sometime. Another one was about lowering health costs for the district and there was a lot of talk about schools getting together and starting clinics and that sort of thing."
Next to share was Board Member Toni Seidl.
"The two keynote speakers that we saw were really good," she said. "Clint Swindall and Sam Glenn. Swindall is the CEO of leadership development at Verbalocity and hails from Texas, while Glenn is a Minnesota native and told stories for effect.
That wasn't all though.
"And then I found myself accidentally in a lot of sessions about referenda," Seidl said, saying she found it interesting and was able to relate to failed referenda at other schools.
Board Member Bob Geist had a funding note from the Association of Equity in Funding.
"They were saying if they can get the low revenue limit up about $1,300 more that 90 percent of the schools in the state would be within 10 percent of each other," he said. "Their other push was going to be on special education funding but right now the state budgets about 30, 31 percent," of district costs, he said. Geist shared a map and explained later that the shortfall in special education funding is made up the district general fund, which then draws on education funding from elsewhere. The state increasing special education funding would alleviate this burden, while divided government at Madison made the WASB less optimistic on the outcome for this goal.
The next school board meeting for Stanley-Boyd is Monday, Feb. 24 at 7 p.m. in the high school library. The public is invited.