KIB School District Board Special Meeting

Diana Gish/KMXT

Before the Kodiak Island Borough School District can receive building funds from the state, it has to have a plan in place that meets Alaska education specifications. In order to ensure that the building plans meet those standards, the district wants to hire a company that specializes in that sort of thing.

For that reason the board of education passed a sole-source contract with DeJong and Associates, to refine the educational specifications document for the Kodiak High School Renovation and Expansion project.

Superintendent Stuart McDonald explained more about what goes into writing what’s called "ed specs."

— (BOE Special 1 "It’s a critical … and finish it.")

McDonald said that DeJong and Associates have a successful record in Alaska for meeting state education specification guidelines. He said that most of the "ed-spec" work has already been done within the district. DeJong and Associates will fine-tune the district’s plans to make sure they fall within all state regulations.

The cost of the contract is around 45,000 dollars.

Also at Monday’s special meeting, the board took steps to open up bidding for an "electronic record retention program." McDonald said the program will turn the school district’s decades of paper documents into retrievable digital files.

— (BOE Special 2 "The district has … sort throught it.")

The board also approved a purchase order for around 112 thousand dollars for the district’s new wireless internet system. The superintendent said that the current wireless router is like one that can be purchased at a department store for home use.

— (BOE Special 3 "But they’re not …particular project.")

Other actions at Monday’s meeting included the hiring of two teachers: Kate Anthony, a reading teacher at Main Elementary and Deanne Wood, an elementary special education teacher at Ouzinkie.