DARLINGTON – Lee Black, Head of Maintenance for the Darlington School District, updated the Darlington School Board of Education on the progress being made at the high school at the meeting Monday night.
The roof is almost 95 percent done. The skylights are gone and the roofers have only lost one and half days of work due to weather.
The ceiling and lights are gone in the technical education hallway. Black said it was interesting to see 50+ years of stuff come out of there.
Music room, woodshop, art room and room 30 have all had their ceilings demoed. New outlets were also installed in those rooms and unit vents have been removed. Drop outlets have been installed over the workstations in the woodshop and metal shop. A door has been cut for the kiln through the storage area in the Art Room. In room 30 or the Fab Lab has the office demoed and Black stated that the room is opened up and looks much bigger. The bathrooms near the Ag shop have been gutted and new breaker boxes have been installed.
With all this work, Black said there hasn’t been a decrease in use of the weight room. The old exhaust and unit vent have been demoed in the weight room. The construction workers have worked around the schedule of when the students are using the room.
Black said there has been a really big change in the library. The collaboration rooms have been studded up and work has begun around the circulation desk.
“It is really starting to come together.”
Other building and grounds projects have kept them busy. The parking lot has had its cracks filled and repaired. They administration and custodial staff made the decision to widen the driveway between the two schools to put in a walk way for anyone to be able to comfortably walk back and forth between the schools. The seventh and eighth grade lockers have been fixed and the drama shed was reroofed and sided by the custodial staff.
New door handles have been installed in DEMS and ovens were replaced Tuesday. Tuck-pointing has been addressed at DEMS and DHS. Black is aware of the portion outside the auditorium that has caused some concern but stated it is only cosmetic and other issues were more pressing, such as in the cafeteria above the ductwork, the blocks were cracking and separating, which was a structural issue.
The board will have a tour of the high school on July 17.
Baseball Field Issues
Nick Zuberbuhler stated that he received a phone call from some Sieg Foundation members, worried and concerned about the DHS baseball field. There has been some significant weed growth and they want to see it put back to the way it looked last year. Tim Osterday commented to Zuberbuhler that he would like to volunteer to clean up the field.
Some of the concerns brought to the board’s attention was that home plate had sunk in, bases were left out, a tarp that covered home base was left on some grass and now the grass had died.
“Lee really does have his plate full,” board president Aaron Wolfe mentioned.
When asked how he felt, Black said he had mixed emotions.
“Two years ago we had a list of volunteers wanting to help and I haven’t seen them in two years. I appreciate everything the Sieg Foundation has done for the school. We knew the field was going to be high maintenance. I won’t lie; once baseball is over, it drops on my priority list,” Black stated.
Black said that to a point they expect that whomever is using the field will but it back to the way they found it or better. They don’t have a good grasp on the amount of people that use the field at night. He said the issues with the weeds is being able to have them sprayed and not have anyone one the field for 72 hours after the application. His staff put in a lot of effort aerating, plugging and fertilizing but it has been a wet spring.
The board discussed possible ways for sprinkler system or alternatives way to combat the weed issues.
Athletic Director
Kurt Cohen spoke about a couple of meetings he had where they discussed football realignment and basketball realignment. It was decided in one meeting to contact nine different conferences (SWAL, SWC, Six Rivers, Coulee, South Central, Mississippi Valley, Ridge and Valley, Scenic Bluffs and Dairyland) to see about their interest in varsity football only realignment based solely on enrollment. There could be a possibility of 56 school districts involved, creating eight 7-team conferences.
At the WIAA Board of control meeting, it was discussed that in the 2019-2020 school year, shot clocks will be added to all high school basketball games in the state of Wisconsin. Cohen was unsure of who will be paying for those added shot clocks but more information will be discussed at later meetings
Other Business
The Darlington School District Board of Education also approved/accepted:
-a donation from Jerry Raddatz, in the amount of $100, to the DHS Lettermen’s Club.
-the resignation of Kalee Crist as the DHS Assistant Cross Country Coach.
-the resignation of Todd Bastain as the DHS Math Teacher after 21 years of service.
-Molly Uppena for the English position at DHS.