Eureka County School Board meeting

The Eureka County School Board held a meeting Feb. 11 at 5:30 p.m.

Kiley Gutierez, representative for the Eureka County High School Student Council, related that, to make students feel like they belong, the student council made an Instagram video, “You Belong. You Matter,” and created a suggestion locker so students can slip in notes to voice concerns and suggestions. Student council elections will take place Feb. 27, with candidates submitting video speeches.

The Diamond Mountain FFA Chapter at Eureka High School related that they have quite a few events planned for National FFA Week, including dress-up days, assemblies and a scavenger hunt. 

The board heard a presentation from Quill Filippini outlining the critical shortage of large animal veterinarians nationwide and supporting the Rural Veterinarian Work Force Act presently before Congress.  

In addition, the board heard from the Soils Team, which earned a state champion title in the Soils Career Development Event last September in Elko and are eligible to compete on the national level this spring. The board approved out-of-state travel for the Diamond Mountain FFA Chapter at Eureka High School to attend the National Soils Competition in El Reno, Oklahoma, April 29 through May 1 at a cost of $5,895 for travel for students Russell Rowley, Austin Zimmerman, Aden Adams, Jack Christiansen and two advisors. 

Next, the board considered a request to purchase two years of PERS (Public Employees’ Retirement System of Nevada) retirement credits for Ralph Cuda, who will be retiring after 20 years of service at the end of this school year. The cost would be approximately $82,500.

While the board noted how much Cuda has done for the community, along with his amazing work, Chairwoman Lynn Conley noted such requests are difficult because if you say yes to one hardworking person, there are always also many others in need.

Conley said the request is above and beyond what is negotiated in the contract with the teachers and would set a very difficult precedent. With regret, the board voted to deny the request.

The board, after an in-depth presentation from Kathryn Benson on five proposals for the school year calendar for 2026-27, narrowed the calendar down to two proposals that are being reviewed to ensure they comply with reporting requirements. The calendar will be reconsidered at the next board meeting. 

The board approved out-of-state travel for the district office staff to attend Tyler Connect 2025 in San Antonio, Texas, May 10-15 at an estimated cost of $10,923 budgeted for with SRSA grant funding.

John Glover, Eureka High School principal, said, “We had 28 students finish the semester with a 4.0 GPA or higher. We had 84 students finish on high honor roll, which is 3.5 or above. We had 36 more finish on the honor roll, which is 3.0 or above; so, in total that’s 120 of our 156 students with a 3.0 or higher.” Glover added, “I was the proudest principal on the planet on that day.” 

He said Winter Fest and basketball were well attended. Mock interviews were held for the seniors last week, some of which Glover conducted. He was highly impressed and said, “It makes me believe they will be employed when they leave Eureka County High School.” 

Turning to sports, the principal said, “Our wrestling team just wrapped up a very successful season,” with eight wrestlers qualified to go to state. Both high school basketball teams are in first place and headed to regionals this weekend in Elko. He hopes they will make it to the state tournament in Las Vegas. The junior high boys basketball team finished second. Thirty-nine FFA students are headed to Winter Leadership in Carson. Spring sports will start Feb. 15.

Elementary schools principal Lisa Hutchison reported that eight staff members will attend the Kagan Cooperative Learning Winter Conference in Las Vegas Feb. 14-17, and they will then train the rest of the staff on Professional Development Day.

Turning to math data, Hutchison related that Eureka Elementary gained 8 percentage points in math from fall to winter. With the new reading curriculum, 53 percent of the students were proficient, which is unchanged from last year. Hutchison said with the new program it may take three years to see gains. 

In Crescent Valley, students gained 5 percent in math. Unfortunately, reading scores dropped a little bit. Hutchison will be bringing back professional development to have “a good conversation around how we can improve instruction with the curriculum.”

The FFA coloring contest will be coming to the elementary schools on Feb. 19.

At Finance Officer Rhonda Wilkins’ advice, the board scheduled the budget workshop for March 24 at 4 p.m. The budget hearing will be combined with the board meeting May 20.

Wilkins noted the bid opening for the track/football field will be March 18. 

Superintendent Tate Else reported the school district presented to the Legislative and Assembly Committees on Education last week. He said the governor’s proposed budget had a shortfall of $335 million dollars, which “doesn’t look amazing for K12 education,” and “they’re still tweaking things within that budget so we don’t have finalized numbers for that and we’re watching that very closely.” There are over 100 bills pertaining to education, and he hopes a “lot of these bills don’t see the light of day.”

As to how the proposed elimination of the Federal Department of Education may impact Eureka County, Else said superintendents across the state had a meeting with the State Department of Education pertaining to that. He commented, “The opinions vary widely as far as what type of impact that would have. One of the things we do know is that prior to the Department of Education existing, Title 1 Funds and IDA funds, which are used for special education, existed. So, what people believe right now is that those funds wouldn’t be impacted. Of course, these are all assumptions. Nobody really knows.” He added, “Our stance here in the district is we just want to make sure we keep doing what we have control of in our sphere and keep doing the things for our students.”