Good morning.
Monday in Whitewater will be cloudy with occasional afternoon thundershowers and a daytime high of eighty-one. Sunrise is 5:58 AM and sunset 8:00 PM, for 14h 02m 10s of daytime. The moon is a waxing gibbous with 91.4% of its visible disk illuminated.Today is the one thousand seventh day.
The Whitewater Unified School District Board meets at 6 PM in closed session, with an open session beginning at 7 PM.
Item 2A on the agenda for the meeting describes the purpose of the closed session: “Adjourn into closed session, pursuant to the provisions of Sec. 19.85(1)(c), Wis. Stats., considering employment, promotion, compensation or performance evaluation data of any public employee over which the governmental body has jurisdiction or exercises responsibility; specifically, to discuss the middle school principal candidate and contract. (Action Item).”
Item 4E describes names the candidate: “Employment – ADMINISTRATOR – Middle School Principal. Motion to approve the employment of Chris Fountain, middle school principal effective ???” [Question marks in original.]
The agenda includes a staff background sheet on Chris Fountain (.pdf), who is now principal of Turtle Creek Elementary School in the Delavan Darien School District, with additional background available in a 2016 news release from that district at the time of his original hiring as a middle school associate principal.
Item 5A on the agenda lists Staffing and Programming Recommendations (Possible Action Item): “Motion to approve the 2019-20 staffing and programming recommendations, as presented.”
The agenda lists these recommendations:
DLT met on August 1st to discuss a 2019-20 budget update. With the budget compiled with all known information, we believe we have $500,000 of revenue or authority available. DLT discussed recommendations:– Combining two part-time special education paraprofessional vacancies at the HS– Updating PA systems in three elementaries and MS– Appropriate additional funds to IT and Curriculum– Increase sub pay 5% and explore a permanent SpEd para sub– Waive summer school fees– Update CO 3rd meeting space– Increase math interventionist at Washington to 1.0 FTE (from 0.5)– Add 1.0 FTE pupil services support at Lincoln/Washington (e.g. social worker)– Increase Lakeview school counselor to 1.0 FTE (from 0.5)– Appropriate $110,000 for classroom updates (amount dependent on final budget)
Whitewater’s Planning Commission also meets at 6:00 PM.
On this day in 1939, the Wizard of Oz has its world premiere in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.
Recommended for reading in full:
Eric Fanning, former Secretary of the Army, remembers When Children at the Border Got Compassion (‘The United States has a moral responsibility for unaccompanied children—and took it seriously, at least in 2014’):
In the spring of 2014, a sudden surge of unaccompanied children began crossing the southern border from Mexico into the United States. I was the undersecretary of the Air Force at the time, and the Pentagon had been tasked with finding facilities and funds so that the Department of Health and Human Services could shelter children until they were reunited with family. It was my job to review the housing that the Air Force would provide. So, with a few others from the Pentagon, I flew down to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, to see for myself that these children were being cared for and protected…..
It was hard for any of us to understand the trauma the children had already experienced. But we knew that our role—our moral responsibility—was not merely to deal with them, but to care for them. And that is exactly what our country did.
We set up multiple facilities on military bases, and HHS worked with a coalition of organizations to shelter these vulnerable children while we looked for proper guardians. There was an outpouring of local community support, from church groups making food to a nearby school donating artificial turf for a soccer field.
A different set of values is now on display, as a new surge of migrants from Central America is fleeing northward toward the United States. Many are escaping extreme violence, while others are yearning for a better life for themselves and their families. Upon their arrival at the American border, the United States is placing these people—including children—in appalling physical conditions, needlessly turning an immigration challenge into a humanitarian crisis.
The policies currently in effect include stripping kids from their families, holding them in conditions unfit for human health, and prioritizing their incarceration over placing them with family or guardians. Every news cycle brings to light new revelations that tug at our hearts: young children caring for infants; kids covered in food and filth, sleeping on cold floors with the lights always on; officials arguing that “safe and sanitary” doesn’t mean providing soap or toothbrushes, let alone the mental-health services children going through traumatic experiences require.