DAYTON–The School Board meeting on September 24 coincided with Homecoming Week as reported by ASB representative and high school junior Grace Trump.

Superintendent Rich Stewart announced during his report the end of the COVID shot requirements for schools and the trial of new key card door security system.

Board Chair Jeff McCowen announced two additions to the agenda, one for an executive session and the other to schedule another Board retreat. Reports were provided about fall athletics by Sam Korslund and for the schools by Elementary Principal Amy Cox and Secondary Principal Guin Joyce.

After the Board approved appointing high school junior Madison Richardson as a student representative for another school year. An ASB report was provided by high school junior Grace Trump about Homecoming Week which included the dress-up days Meme Monday to come as your favorite meme, Twin Tuesday, White Out Wednesday which included a Color Run, Throwback Thursday to dress in your favorite style from the past and Fan Friday to wear school colors. Other activities included the resurrected Powderpuff Girls Football Game (photo) on Wednesday and High School Lip Sync on Thursday followed by the Stud (boys) Volleyball Game (photo), and on Friday a Pep Rally was held before the football game Friday night when the Homecoming Courts for each school were to be announced. The week would end with a DW joint Masquerade Dance at the Dayton Elementary multi-purpose room on Saturday night.

Athletic Director Sam Korslund reported current participation numbers for fall athletics with high school football at 30, high school volleyball at 13, seven for cheer, middle school football at 21 and a large turnout for middle school volleyball at 36. He said for the latter, the girls practice together but split into two teams with two squads and each have their own game schedule. Having two teams means there is one home game and one away game each week. They have two coaches, but he said it is doable with parent help.

They are preparing to open winter sports registration and plan to offer middle and high school wrestling once new mats are delivered and if there is a strong enough interest.

Board Director Grant Griffen questioned where the decision was made to add sixth graders to middle school sports (with the exception of football which is only allowable by the State to seventh and eighth graders).

Korslund said the overall feedback was that if they are in middle school, they should play. Other schools in the league have sixth graders and sometimes fifth graders. He added that relying on turnout numbers to determine if sixth graders can play is inequitable for boys and girls sports where some could play and others couldn't.

Elementary Principal Amy Cox has formed a team for Positive Behavior Interventions Systems (PBIS) and they have met several times. The team formed the school slogan Bulldog BRAVE which is featured on posters around campus (see photo). BRAVE stands for Bold, Responsible, Attitude, Value and Empathy. PBIS creates a common language that allows for clear expectations for all students around the campus. One example she gave for how they are doing this is posting voice level expectation signs for various spaces.

Assemblies will recognize students who have been a good example of the expectations where they will be awarded a trophy and a "Breakfast of Champions." Students of the Month will continue to selected based a select trait from Character Strong each month. September's Character Strong trait is respect.

Secondary Principal Guin Joyce said she met with staff to determine which of the five goals set by the School Board should they focus on and they decided on school climate, communication and academic excellence. Her reports will be based on ways the secondary school is working to meet those goals. For school climate she said, "Our Dean of Students and Student Service Support have been instrumental in working with students who are having challenges during the day at school. We, as a whole secondary school team, discuss situations, contact and conference with families, review trends of situations and support students."

For communication she said they are mailing out positive postcards for students as had been done in the past. For academic excellence, teachers will be making plans for each student based on the results from the students' MAP assessment testing for language, math and science.

Superintendent Rich Stewart began his report by announcing that schools are now exempt from the COVID shot requirement. He also said the district is trying out a new key card door security system for increased safety. The Board then decided on a retreat following the work session on October 5 before going into executive session.

During public comment Jeremy Trump voiced optimism. "I've been around the school a lot the last couple weeks. There's some really good energy, really good enthusiasm, and a lot of cool things going on." McCowen replied, "We've got a lot of people putting in a lot of effort to move in a positive direction."