Cloverdale begins new year with election of officers

CLOVERDALE -- With the start of the new year brings new officers for the Cloverdale School Board, which met for its monthly meeting on Monday evening.

Nominated by their peers, Donna Fidler returned to the president's seat with Duane Huge moving to vice president. Bobbi Nees will also fill the position of secretary.

The board also approved keeping its established board meeting dates and times as the second Monday of the month at 7 p.m. Board members will also continue to receive a total of $2,000 a year for compensation.

Debbie Rollings will remain as the corporation treasurer with Lynn Lotz as her deputy and Ice Miller as the corporation's attorney.

Cloverdale Superintendent Carrie Milner also noted to the board that during a November trip to Indianapolis, one of their own, Beth Sewell, was awarded the Gold Star School Counseling Award.

"We received this award one other time in 2007," Milner explained. "It was a lot of work even being seven years later, it's still a lot of work."

The award itself is given to schools based on the Indiana Program Standards for School Counseling. In order to be considered a detail portfolio is sent in, which is then reviewed by committee members.

Area 30 Career Center Director Lora Busch also paid a visit to Cloverdale in hopes of informing the community about several of the successful programs the school offers.

Busch highlighted several of Area 30's programs, such as its certified nursing students who are currently wrapping up their clinicals and preparing for their written and skills portion of their state certification test, which will be taken in March.

Busch also highlighted the school's law enforcement students, which recently participated in Project Blue Light at the Indiana Law Enforcement Academy in Plainfield, which honors all fallen officers.

Students will also be participating in a defensive driving class at the academy in the near future.

"We're not a huge school, but we try and build options for our students to move within a pathway to build on a future," Busch said of the programs offered.

Busch also noted that many of the students at Area 30 are also preparing for some annual spring competitions such as the Skills USA, ProStart and Health Occupation Students of American competitions.

"We have a really good career center," Milner said. "It continues to grow and evolve. We're seeing fewer students collectively come in and still the quality of our programs are strong."

Milner transitioned from Area 30 to inform the board on the highlights of a recent finance meeting, which was filled with good news for the corporation.

"We feel good about our future," Milner said. "We are reasonably good. With all the changes coming from the state we do have fewer students with us, but we've managed to keep our cash balances strong."

Milner also noted that several students have recently come back to Cloverdale, which the corporation is glad to have back.

The board also approved its 2014-15 school calendar, which is similar to all area schools.

"We try very hard to align our calendar to Area 30 and our special services corporative," Milner said. "It's tricky to have everything exactly the same, but most of us are starting the students either the Friday or the Monday of the second week of August. It's not earlier or later, it's pretty close to the same start date for our students."

Cloverdale students will begin school on Monday, Aug. 11 and like this year, the corporation will have a weeklong fall break in October. Students are also set to have their last day on Friday, May 29 with graduation being Saturday, May 30.

The corporation also honored Clayton Peterson, Trinity Davis and Kyleigh Roberts as the students of the month.

Finally, the board approved the hiring of Kim Fulkerson as part-time cafeteria help at the middle school; Zach Waycott as the high school volunteer wrestling coach and varsity boys track coach; and Carin Price as volunteer cheer assistant at the middle school.