The Webster City School Board approved a tentative agreement with Webster City Educational Support Association Monday evening. The total package for wages is $60,500, a 2.65 percent increase.

“That brings that contract into compliance with current legislation,” said Superintendent Mike Sherwood.

The board approved to raise substitute teacher rates from $100 a day to $105 a day. It was approved to raise the rates of the summer youth, summer custodial, summer youth maintenance, summer maintenance, summer technology and coaching assistant by $.15 per hour. It was approved to keep the rates the same for the tutor, summer school and extended year instruction positions. The activity bus driver rate was also increased to $10.50 per hour.

The ISEBA insurance plan for the 2017-2018 school year was approved.

“This is the partial self-funding plan that would raise the deductibles. The staff would not see any change in deductibles” said Sherwood. “The only thing the staff would really see different would be total out-of-pocket maximum would go to 20 percent…their reimbursement process would be slightly different.”

There will be a meeting for school staff to discuss the new insurance plan on Wednesday at 3 p.m. There will be representatives with ISEBA at the meeting to help explain the process.

Non-Bargaining/Administrative salaries were approved by the board.

“What’s usually been done is the non-bargaining employees get the same increase as the support staff, which will be 2.56 percent, a total increase of $25,682 for all non-bargaining employees” said Sherwood.

According to Sherwood, the administrative team usually gets the same increase as teaching staff, or 1.66 precent, for a total increase of $12,838.

Total settlements in the district for non-bargaining/administrators, teachers and support staff is $224,360.

An Apple iPad lease agreement was also approved Monday evening. The lease is for iPads for grade two through 12. The district will be leasing 1700 iPads and 425 Belkin keyboards for the 2017-2018 school year. The iPads will be leased for $294 per unit and the keyboards will be leased for $45 per unit. The total agreement cost is $518,925 according to Sherwood. The amount will be paid in annual installments for four years. Each year’s installment will cost $127,137. The first payment is due July 15, 2017.

“We were looking at purchasing the iPad minis outright and keeping those as they are still working for our pre-k and first grade students,” Sherwood said. “We can buy back those units at $200 a unit.”

The board approved the resignations of Andy Brim, Lynn Corrow, Gary Scholtens and Dawn Scholtens. Contract recommendations for Lisa Stansfield, Elise Keston and Kathy Dingman were approved.

A natural gas proposal from Center Point Energy was approved by the board.

Board member Beth Van Diest was not present at Monday night’s meeting.

The next school board meeting will be on Monday, June 26 at 6 p.m.