The Crookston School Board had a special meeting on Wednesday evening in the Crookston High School Choir/Orchestra room. The room was full of school district staff and parents. In the open forum, a steady line of teachers, staff, and parents spoke against several cuts and most of them were in favor of keeping the instructional aids at Washington School. “I love that we live in America and express their concerns and feelings and we had a large number of people here tonight,” said Superintendent Randy Bergquist. “They were passionate about keeping the kindergarten aids in the classroom. Everybody was respectful and they talked about how much they want to have kindergarten and preschool to have adequate instruction because that is technically the first stage of their career. I thought everybody did a great job.”
The board approved proposed budget cuts for the 2025-26 school year. The cuts are cost savings instead of actual cuts for the district. The district won’t purchase a bus, which will save $168,500. They won’t replace an elective language teacher that resigned saving $72,371 and won’t replace Social Studies teacher that resigned saving $72,000, they made a reduction of a bus driver/mechanic saving $77,000. They will be reducing the pre-kindergarten classes from seven to six, which will save $57,700 and an aid which will save $28,000. Another big savings will be a Title II position that won’t be filled after a retirement, which will save $47,000. “We have talked about looking at cutting the number of sporting events for each team,” said Superintendent Bergquist. “For example instead of playing 26 games we would play 25 or 24 games. So I am going to try to get a better handle on that. Also the school board gets a stipend to be on the board and we have been paying them to be on committees and we are going to stop that and that will save approximately $15,000 on that.” The complete list of savings for next school year are pictured at the bottom of the story.
The board approved the termination and nonrenewal of Thomas Sherman and Annika Cuevas as Success Coaches and Marcel Vaudrin as a mechanic/bus driver. The board also approved a reduction of Crystal Rock from a 12-month to an 11-month contract. “When we made these cuts we tried to make ones that would have the least effect on students,” said Superintendent Bergquist.
The board lumped the non-renewal of Instructional Assistants: Barbara Holweger, Kayla LaCoursiere, Clayton Briggs, Megan Gangl, Carole Chaput, Kathleen Goodyke, Heather Rosu, and Skylar Plonta into one motion and there was a first, but nobody made a second motion so the motion died and the board will keep the instructional assistants after hearing loud and clear from the people in attendance that they want to keep the instructional assists. The move will keep about $140,000 to $150,000 on the payroll for the district. “There wasn’t a second, which is great, which means the board supports the fact that there’s going to be instructional assistants in the Kindergarten in the classrooms,” said Superintendent Bergquist. “So my job now is to look at some potential other cuts that could potentially be up to $140,000 to $150,000. The Kindergarten teachers made it clear they would rather have the instructional assistants in the classroom instead of an additional Kindergarten class.”
The parents in attendance made comments that they wanted to keep the instructional assistants and getting rid of them might have them choosing other schools. “The parents made some good comments,” said Superintendent Bergquist. “They said if we don’t have the instructional assistants that there is other schools out there and I think our goal as a school district is to try to get the kids in early and hopefully they will continue to stay all the way through 12th grade.”
The board approved the closure of Washington Elementary School at the end of the 2025-26 school year on a 5 to 1 vote with Jaclyn Martin, Tim Dufault, Mike Thies, Lori Capistran, and Patti Dillabough voting yes. Marcia Meine was the lone no vote. “Before my time it was talked about that Washington was going to be closed. It has been a great addition for preschool and we have a couple of daycares in there as well and a family resource center,” said Superintendent Bergquist. “We will have to reconfigure what we are going to do with that, but the board has made it clear that we will be closing Washington School after next year for a potential savings of approximately $131,000.”
The preschool teachers in attendance said they don’t have a problem moving to Highland School if it is what is best for the students and the district, but they want to be a part of the planning process. “I pleasantly surprised that was said. It is obviously going to happen and they want us to keep them in the loop and help out,” said Superintendent Bergquist.
The final item on the agenda was the board approving offering dental and vision insurance at no cost for the district and it is voluntary for staff to participate in and the cost would be solely paid by the staff and not the district. “We were going out for bids and one of the companies we are going to go with said they can offer dental and vision insurance at no cost to the district. It would be a cost to the employee to see if they would be interested and I think that makes sense. It’s voluntary and they don’t have to take it, but if you take it you have to pay for it.”
The next Crookston School Board meeting will be Monday, May 19 at 5:00 p.m. in the Crookston High School choir/orchestra room.
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