School board thanks administrators after demanding Covid school year

The Whitefish School Board of Trustees at its June 8 meeting considered several discussion and action items.

Topics included:

Graduations and fundraisers

The Whitefish School Board’s student trustee Aaron Dicks gave an update from the schools.

He reported that Whitefish High School had a successful graduation ceremony on June 5 during which 131 seniors graduated. The ceremony was live streamed thanks to the district’s technology department so that all families and friends that couldn’t attend were still able to watch.

The graduating class donated $297 to their nonprofit organization of choice, the Stumptown Art Studio.

The Whitefish Independent High School also had their graduation ceremony on June 3 and graduated nine students.

The elementary and middle schools have been busy fundraising during the last few weeks of the school year. Muldown hosted its annual Fun Run for grades Kindergarten through fourth on May 26 with the goal to raise $30,000.

“The fun run was an amazing experience for everyone involved and, above all, over $69,000 was raised; the money came from 44 different states and three foreign countries,” Dicks told the board.

Fifth and sixth graders had a fundraiser of their own, the first-ever Dance-A-Thon. Over $13,000 was raised during the event that took place on May 27-28.

Muldown update

The Whitefish School District’s Muldown Elementary School project — which involved constructing a new school building, tearing down most of the old building, buttoning up the old kindergarten wing that would become an annex building and constructing a maintenance and receiving building — is nearing completion.

The district’s business director Lucie Shea told the board that the project is nearly 99% complete. That includes finishing the annex, which originally was planned to be buttoned up and left to be completed into usable space at a later date. Throughout the process the district was able to save in multiple areas, remaining under budget for the entirety of the project, which led them to being able to finish the annex building.

“We have managed to budget very well and it will either come out as a wash or there will be money leftover,” Shea said.

The annex is awaiting a new air conditioning unit and after that the City of Whitefish will complete their final inspections of both the annex and the maintenance building which should lead to issuing a certificate of occupancy for both.

The student services director Adina Welsh and her secretary will move into the annex building after the district obtains the certificate of occupancy.

“They will be much closer to the students they serve and will have some nice new spaces with big windows,” Shea explained.

She added that the painting and landscaping is all nearly complete.

“I just like the color scheme of it all, it’s so cheerful from a distance,” she added. “And it all ties together, the Muldown building with the annex and the maintenance building — it’s just lovely.”

Superintendent message

Superintendent Dave Means delivered a message to the board to celebrate the students and the end of a successful school year.

“We’re in the process of celebrating our students, our graduates, just all that they have overcome through the challenges of this year has been amazing,” he said. “Their resiliency and how they’ve achieved and progressed throughout the year is amazing.”

He was also impressed with the collaborative effort between staff, teachers and parents that created a great net of support for students this year.

Whitefish’s Summer Learning Program is starting up soon. There are three sessions — the first is June 21 through July 1, the second is July 6-15, and the last session is July 19-29. Means said that many students are signed up and the sessions are nearly full.

“We initially went in with three two-week sessions in the afternoon and the majority of parents were able to get into all three if they wanted,” he told the board.

Thanks to administrators

Board Chair Katie Clarke commended the administration in the Whitefish School District on leading the way through a challenging year.

She thanked each building principal and assistant principal as well as the Superintendent Dave Means and Director of Business Lucie Shea.

“You all just surpassed any expectations,” she said.