Mount Airy City Schools granted $1.75 million

Preparations for the next budget year for the county resumed Tuesday night with the county commissioners hearing from the five county rescue squads, Surry Community College and the three public school systems. Each presentation is a chance to look at the year that was, and the plans for each group.

The big news of the evening was that $1.75 million in funds Mount Airy City Schools asked for has been satisfied and can be removed from their budget request.

State Superintendent Catherine Truitt sent an email to Dr. Kim Morrison of Mount Airy City Schools Tuesday with news from Raleigh that will have a lasting impact. She announced that the Needs-Based School Capital Fund in the amount of $1,750,822 to be used for the renovation of the CTE building at Mount Airy High School has been approved.

Compared to some of the other grant requests from this area, the CTE renovations were on the smaller end of the spectrum. Surry County Schools sent in one application for each of the three high schools with those grant amounts reaching nearly $40 million apiece. CTE improvements will include modifications to the building to achieve Americans with Disabilities Act accessibility standards.

In her opening, Morrison asked the board to consider a local business who over the past six years has grown from a $17 million to a $28 million company while attracting 5% of the market share. At the same time this business has brought in outside funding topping $4 million, hired top talent, and been a steady pillar of the community. She said any medium size business that produced such results would be seen as a success, and of course she is describing Mount Airy City Schools.

Morrison offered praise to her staff and teachers for helping students to reach first in the state in Math 1 and Math 3, and fourth in state overall in end of grade testing. The system is double digits above the state average in academic achievement and 100% of Mount Airy City teachers have been growing children where they are expected, or higher, “so to us that means the whole team wins. They’ve done such a great job.”

She went on the call the schools “the hub of the Mount Airy community” that are producing graduates at a high rate. They are working harder now with local business partners and programs such as Surry Yadkin Works to retain graduates here in Surry County. The system has grown its workforce credential program, “at a time when some places would not take interns, we have been able to move forward with 164 credentials last year and over 100 students and internships.”

Even during the pandemic workforce development continues to be a prioritize. The ‘next gen’ program has 38 paid interns, “many of those are going straight into the workforce after they finish their internship. Our CTE interns are around 86, one fourth of those are paid. The apprenticeship part of Surry Yadkin Works is what we were missing from our internships,” and have helped place three students into apprenticeship this year at Northern Regional Hospital.

New programs added recently include entrepreneurship, health science, aviation science, and a construction program she hopes will be moving to a full-time status this year. The system was able to bring in $2 million in outside money this year from 40 local businesses to offset the needs of these new programs.

She touted a dual language program that has doubled its capacity in recent years, which she considers as another workforce development program because over one fourth of every class will graduate fluent in at least two languages. Local industry partners need Spanish speakers, but also with so many partnerships with China, a Chinese language program has become popular. There are students travelling from out of county specifically for these language and workforce programs.

Successes outlined; Morrison walked the commissioner through some of the needs her system has. “I took care of the CTE funding, you can take care of all this.” Her system needs include in part a new used truck for maintenance at the high school, a new truck “as you know is not $20,000.”

A new roof is needed on the concession stand at the football field and the auditorium, as well as a new stage, “We can’t repair the stage if we can’t repair the roof, so we bundled them. We are paying for HVAC replacement, so we need the roof to be able to support it.” Safety and facility upgrades are needed to add door latches for instances of school lockdowns, lighting improvements in gyms, and a purchase of a floor scrubber.

There are still places where carpet removal and replacement are needed, and that may lead to discovery of asbestos. “Abatement, we don’t like to talk about abatement, but as you know we got the state to cover 80% of abatement. There are some rooms we haven’t gone into, and at the state level, when you find asbestos during renovations the state will help with 80% of the cost.”

Blue Bear Café and media center need some cosmetic improvements, and Morrison also added a minibus and van to the budget to get groups to competitions and such. Paving and repair of track surfaces will require half funding as Audra Chilton was able to get these repairs added onto an approved list of ESSER items.

The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief injected $193 million of pandemic relief funds to public schools and has help to offset some big needs such as paving, HVAC, athletic facility upgrades, and equipment need. This plan will yield the district $700,000 in savings, “We are very thankful those are coming from ESSER money, but those funds are coming to an end.”

Challenges facing the school system include inflationary costs, the exponential growth of retiree benefits, and an increase to the state minimum wage that will translate to $270,000 in additional wages. Morrison also detailed a few of the long-term projects facing the district as well such as repair or replacement of geothermal loops at the high school – which she says has been a recurring repair cost.

A discussion was had about prioritization of future projects with Chairman Bill Goins asking about the priorities list when he saw roof repair listed after a vape monitoring system. Could that be correct, he asked?

“Yes, student safety to us is more important. It is hugely important, (vaping) is our number one offense at the high and middle school.” Commissioner Mark Marion agreed saying his daughter has told him tales of vaping – she is in sixth grade.

“We think we can really cut it down; it is a safety issue and an addiction issue for kids.” She noted Davie County has reported a 50% drop in vaping since instituting a monitoring system, and that they estimate Mount Airy City Schools usage at 30%.

“It is one of the top things in the state that kids are addicted to it, and then they can’t get off it even if they want to if they start in middle school. So, we are trying to keep them from starting.”