School Supt. Kudlak gets raise to $142,000, another year on contract

After unanimously praising School Supt. Pete Kudlak’s work at Monday’s regular meeting, the Van Buren Public Schools Board of Education voted to raise his pay to $142,000 and to extend his contract for an additional year – to June 30, 2022.
He will be beginning his third year at Van Buren this summer. His salary for the 2017-18 school year was $132,600 and for the 2018-19 school year, $140,000.
Under the contract, unless the school board makes a decision on the term of the contract by June 1, another year will be automatically added.
“I think you’ve done a lot since you’ve been here,” said School Board President Keith Johnston, pointing out he is involved in the community and some growth is being shown in test scores.
“I really do appreciate your dedication to the district,” Johnston said.
Board member Amy Pearce said one of the things that impressed her was that nothing was a surprise to him. When she brings up issues, she said, he tells her that he is aware of the issue and he is working on it.
“He really has his finger on the pulse of each of our buildings, and I don’t know how that happens,” she said.
Johnston said he no longer needs to go to Meijer’s to have people tell him about problems at the school. He just goes to Kudlak and he becomes informed.
Board Secretary Darlene Loyer Gerick said it is noticed by the community that he goes to everything. She also said people feel comfortable coming up to him to talk, if only to say hello.
Board Treasurer Simone Pinter said everything she has heard in the community or from the staff about this superintendent is positive, for a change.
“I’ve never heard a negative thing about you,” she said to Kudlak.
Treasurer Susan Featheringill said people in the community have told her the board made a good choice in choosing this superintendent.
Johnston said the pay proposed is about in the middle of the pack for superintendents, “But, he’s above the middle of the pack…”
Featheringill made the motion, supported by Pinter, and the motion passed unanimously. Board member Calvin Hawkins was absent from the meeting.
“I love being here,” Supt. Kudlak said. “It’s a great community. The building administrators are fantastic.”
Featheringill said the staff is looking out for him.
Board member Pearce joked that she would like him try to have not so many snow days next year and the rest of the board laughed.
In other business at Monday’s meeting, the board:
• Approved the new Tiger logo and Paw logo as proposed by a committee that has been meeting since October. Debbie McWilliams collected tiger logos from around the country, including those for high schools, colleges, and businesses. The committee decided how real and how ferocious they wanted the district’s tiger to look. They considered different orange colors and different fonts for the lettering. This will be to make all the logos for the district standardized and all the letterheads will become standardized, as well. “This is to make sure we have one common structure,” Supt. Kudlak said;
• Received a report by Special Projects Coordinator Jane Stalmack and Rawsonville Media Teacher Mary Ellen Vago on the second-annual STEAM Showcase held recently to showcase technology used in the district. Next year’s STEAM Showcase is set for Saturday, Jan. 25, 2020;
• Honored individual athletes who qualified for state competition: wrestlers Jaden Rice and Blake Williams, swimmer Jack Haase, and bowler Katherine Dybicki. Also honored were their coaches and athletic director;
• Approved hiring Samantha Tanana for the Edgemont Elementary Resource Room as of March 11;
• Heard parent Angela Mears ask if students are going to have to go to school on Good Friday to make up for a snow day. Supt. Kudlak said the district had 11 snow days and were allowed six. Three were forgiven and he still doesn’t know if the district will have to make up the rest. There are moves in the legislature to forgive days lost under the Governor’s emergency proclamation and/or to allow hours to be counted instead of days. He said he talked to State Rep. Kristi Pagans and she said something will be happening soon in the Legislature, but time is running short and districts need to know;
• Learned BHS has been chosen by the Wayne County Immunizations Drill to be a site for the Health Emergency Preparation Team to do mass inoculations in case of an emergency. On March 22, they will borrow 400 students and run a drill at the school to further familiarize the staff with the site. There will be no shots given, just logistics worked out. Steve Jones said such inoculations would be necessary in a case of bird flu, “or something”;
• Heard Pearce announce the Owen Intermediate School clothes closet and food closet will be open to the public during the conferences this week. A person does not need to have students at Owen to take advantage of the free clothes and food;
• Heard Curriculum Director Jeff Moore say the fourth graders are taking part in a competency-based program that could bring a grant from $500,000 to $1 million. He said they are in phase one of the three-round process, with the goal of increasing the technical talent pool in the state. “We’re hoping to have good news at the end of the school year,” he said; and
• Heard Supt. Kudlak say he has been going through interviews for a replacement for former Financial Director Shareen Barker and he hopes to have a decision on Wednesday, with the new director starting as soon as possible since it is time to work on budgets.