Evangeline Parish School Board gets updated on pre-school year issues

The Evangeline Parish School Board met Wednesday evening and was updated on flooding issues at school campuses, test scores, and taxes collected for the fiscal year.
Superintendent Darwan Lazard said he recently went to Washington, D.C. and had meetings with Dr. Ralph Abraham and Congressman Mike Johnson’s office where they discussed the flooding issues at some of the school campuses. He said, “Hopefully, it will lead to other agencies in the parish doing some things to hopefully help us as we try to alleviate flooding.” He said the flooding primarily occurs at Mamou High and Mamou Elementary, and at James Stephens. He thanked Jason Hazelton and his crew, as well as school custodians and principals for pro-active measures which prevented any overwhelming flooding issues related to Hurricane Barry.
In regards to his trip to Washington, D.C., Lazard added he visited the office of Senator John Kennedy. “The Louisiana delegation is very much in support of what we’re doing in Evangeline Parish,” said Lazard.
Lazard also said they are evaluating test scores recently released by the state to see where they need to give more support to teachers and students. “We want every school, every campus, to do well,” he said. He added, “It looks like we did hold our own” with regards to the state average for grades three, four, seven, eight, and the high school testing areas. “But looks like we do have some additional work to do and some support to give in grades five and six. We’ll be looking at that in a more detailed fashion. We’ll look at it in comparison to other districts, and we’ll also be looking at it in comparison how that group of students performed last year, and how did they perform this year. We want to make sure every year is a good year for all our students. We feel like if they do well every year, then that’s good for the district and good for school system.”
Lazard also announced with all the lighting upgrades and improvements made to all campuses, it looks like they will be eligible for $85,000 related to the project and incentives put forth by CLECO. Lazard said they want to use that money to provide support to the teachers, so they can have the materials they need.
CFO Amy LaFleur said the tax collected for the 2018/2019 fiscal year was $7,429,042.01. After personnel and benefits costs, the total excess to be distributed in November will be $2,448,184.36, which is $163,787.52 more than distributed last year.
In other business the board:
• approved $14,105 for chromebooks for Chataignier Elementary for second grade students.
• approved $26,250 for user licenses for virtual classroom and web administrator.
• approved $15,114.56 for online Eureka Math renewal.
• accepted low price quote of $8,400 from AES Environmental Services for mold remediation at Basile High School.
• adopted millage rates for the 2019 tax year for Evangeline Parish and for Evangeline Parish School District located in Acadia Parish.
• approved $28,334 for computers for Ville Platte High School Business Computer Lab.