Elk River School District to add special education staff

District discusses specialized population groups, bonds

by Jessica Charpentier

APG of East Central Minnesota

On Jan. 22, the Elk River Area School Board held a special school board meeting and a work session. All board members were present except for Sara Weis.

At the special meeting, the board unanimously approved every action item on the agenda, including policies about health and safety, extracurricular transportation, video surveillance, equal employment opportunity and more.

During the work session, Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services Jamie Nord and Director of Student Services, Research, and Planning Dr. Joe Stangler provided a special populations enrollment update and explained how special populations will impact staffing recommendations for the 2024-25 school year.

Enrollment for specialized groups

Students receiving special education that were included in the child count as of Dec. 1, 2023, must have had a valid individualized education plan/individual family service plan, an evaluation/reevaluation that is less than three years old (as of Dec. 1), and must have been receiving special education.

The special education child count has increased from 2,339 in 2019 to 2,668 in 2023. Based on state guidelines, the special education population will have an impact on staffing for ISD 728 for the 2024-25 school year.

A more extensive dive into data to determine program needs for the next school year was recommended by the district as well as considering licensure as a result of programmatic needs with staffing.

Another special population is English learners (multilingual learners) within the school district. The program has seen a dramatic increase in the number of students who are served in the past six years, going from 286 students in 2017-18 to 572 in the 2023-24 school year.

At the same time, the needs of students have increased as the number of home languages spoken by the families of English learners increased from 42 to 73 in the past five years. ISD 728 is also one of six Minnesota school districts receiving an immigrant grant, based on the number of students arriving in the district that are new to the United States.

Over time, the number of students exiting the program has remained relatively the same, but more students have been scoring not proficient on the ACCESS test, which is an English language proficiency assessment. A total of 249 students scored not proficient in 2019, 283 in 2020, 315 in 2021, 364 in 2022, and 482 in 2023.

Currently, the English Learner program has 13.1 full-time teachers for services to students in all district K-12 buildings. Recently, three program assistants were added to the high schools to assist students in meeting their career and college goals by providing additional help so they can graduate on time.

An English learner coordinator was also added to enhance staff professional development and make connections with families so the district can improve services to students.

General obligation refunding bonds

Ehlers Public Finance Advisors Jodie Zesbaugh and Jen Chapman presented a pre-sale report to ISD 728 about the school board’s intention to issue General Obligation Refunding Bonds. The school board originally approved almost $96 million in bonds on Jan. 8, but now currently estimates that $86 million in General Obligation School Building and Alternative Facilities Refunding Bonds will be required.

The refunding caused by the reduction will result in a lowered interest rate of the 2015A and 2015B bonds from 3-4%, to an estimated true interest cost of 2.95% and 2.89%. This new interest rate and the premium that the underwriter of the bonds will pay when refunding the bonds is estimated to reduce future debt service payments for the 2015A bonds by $1.5 million from fiscal year 2025 through 2033 and $269,440 from fiscal year 2025 through 2029 for the 2015B bonds.

The reduction of future debt service payments will lower property tax levies primarily for taxes payable in 2030-2032. The net present value benefit of the 2015A bond refunding is estimated to be $1,181,854, which is equal to 1.38% of the refunded debt service. Net present value benefit takes into account the time value of money, and the net present value benefit of the 2015B bonds is estimated to be $243,167, which is 2.08% of the refunded debt service.

Ehlers plans to accept bids on Feb. 7 and the school board will adopt a resolution ratifying the award of sale at the Feb. 12 school board meeting. The estimated closing date of the sale is Feb. 28.