School Board OKs Transcript Change

By Andrew Atwal
andrew.atwal@yankton.net

The Yankton School District (YSD) school board approved changes to the district’s transcript policy for the high school during their meeting on Monday night.

Yankton High School (YHS) principal Dr. Wayne Kindle told the board how dated the transcript policy was, and how much time it took guidance counselors at the school to get requests from students and  send out each transcript through the mail.

The new policy will allow students to go online, using a program called Docufide Sender, to send their transcripts wherever they needed to go. Each student will get confirmation emails when his or her request is sent, when it is approved by a counselor and when the school received the transcript.

“Schools all across the country use electronic transcript programs,” Kindle said. “The program saves time, is quick and it’s not just a wait-and-see thing like how we currently send our transcripts.”

Officials in the district spoke to employees in the admissions department at the University of South Dakota, and they said they were with the electronic transcript programs.

“USD is a big believer in the system and it saves a lot of time for a lot of different people who have had to go searching for transcripts,” said YHS counselor Terry Crandall.

So far, more than 8,000 schools and colleges across the country use the service.

There were two different pay models the school board considered. One would have charged students at least $3 for each transcript they sent, while the other would have the school pay a fee of $1,000 which would cover all student transcript request. The board decided the $1,000 fee would be best and could end up saving the district a substantial amount of money in the long run.

Also Monday Night, school board members changed their meeting policy to include a teleconference option if some members can’t be present at a particular meeting.

Also, officials made some changes to the cell phone and digital media policy in order to be in compliance with SB 183, which defines “sexting” as a Class One misdemeanor. In addition, the policy protects students’ privacy in regards to some students posting images of teachers and classmates on Facebook pages without consent.

“There are some nasty things going on with the use of cell phones,” said YSD superintendent Dr. Joe Gertsema. “This will be an evolving policy and gives some additional guidance to administrators in the district.”

Gertsema added that phones and other devices can be used in a positive way. For instance, some teachers use them to have instant surveys or informal exams in the classroom.

The school board also made changes to the textbook loaning policy. The change puts the district in line with SB 186 which now includes both digital and print textbooks but does not yet include any digital hardware as part of the law.

The board heard a report from Lt. Mike Burgeson of the Yankton Police Department about joint programs between the district and police, including the D.A.R.E. program, and a potential school resource officer program in the future.

“We want to create an effective learning environment with the safety and security of students and teachers in mind,” he said. “There is mutual respect and cooperation between the police department and the school district.”

Additional agenda items included:

• Authorizing the business manager, Jason Bietz, to define the scope of work and advertise proposals from energy performance contractors

• Accepting a proposal from Discovery Benefits for COBRA administrative services for the YSD employee medical and prescription drug benefit plan

• Members heard a report from Mount Marty College professor Nick Shudak on the new Master of Education program

At the end of the meeting, officials met in executive session to discuss negotiations and a personnel matter.

You can follow Andrew Atwal on Twitter at twitter.com/andrewatwal

http://www.yankton.net/articles/2012/11/20/community/doc50ab07bb80786585901745.txt