Welcome Back!

We hope you had an enjoyable holiday break and were able to spend time doing some of the things you enjoy.

Our promise to you for 2021 is to continue providing a safe, caring, and healthy learning environment for our students, staff, and families. To do so, we are asking for your continued support in wearing face-coverings, maintaining social distancing, and continued practices of good hygiene.

As a reminder, we ask that you mark your calendars and begin to prepare for the two additional days we have added as Vaccination/ Teacher Workdays. On these dates, we will not have school or afterschool programs for our students.

These dates are January 15, 2021, and February 12, 2021

As is the case with many entities during this time, NPPS is facing a budget shortfall. As you will see in the information to follow, this shortfall will leave the district Board of Education with difficult decisions. We are sharing information that will be presented to the board and ask that you reach out with any ideas you have to help continue moving NPPS forward.

2021 – 2022 Budget Development Planning Document

North Platte Public Schools is dedicated to providing the highest quality education to each North Platte student from pre-K through grade 12. It is essential to involve the ideas of both school personnel and community constituency. The NPPS District will be challenged to reduce the 2021 - 2022 budget by $2 million.

The Board of Education will be discussing this topic on January 11, 2021, at the Board of Education meeting. Parents are always welcome to attend Board meetings. We ask that you follow all safety guidelines. We will have the personnel available to assist you with following safety protocols, maintaining social distancing, and ensuring the proper use of face coverings. We have several rooms available for viewing the Board meeting. During public comment time, we will have personnel available to help direct you to speak to the Board in a safe environment.

We have included a tentative timeline at the end of this document.

Current Board of Education Budget Reduction Options:

Option #1: Merge Lake/Osgood Elementary into the remaining elementary schools. Cost savings would equal approximately $1.3 million. The remaining balance would come out of Cash Reserves in the amount of $700,000.

Option #2: Use 100% Cash Reserves of $2.0 million. Caution, this will put the District in an ‘at-risk’ financial position in future years.

Option #3: Merge 2020-21 Kindergarten class (current) at Osgood and the 2021-22 Kindergarten class for the 2021-22 school year. Maintain the grades 2,3,4,5 at Lake, reduce administration to .5 FTE

Approximate savings = $300,000-400,000 + $1.7million Cash Reserves

Option #4:

· 2021-22 - - Merge 2020-21 Kindergarten class (current) at Osgood and the 2021-22 Kindergarten class for the 2021-22 school year. Maintain the grades 2,3,4,5 at Lake, reduce admiration to .5 FTE

Approximate savings = $300,000-400,000 + $1.7million Cash Reserves

· 2022-23 - - merge all grade levels (2-5) in 2022-23 = *$1.0 million

*Replenish the Cash Reserve $1.0 million

Option #5: Madison MS - Adams MS merger

· research cost savings and space availability

o 44 classrooms @ 25 students a room = 1100

o Current enrollment at Adams: 586 and Madison is 308 = 894: See map of Building

o 586 +308 = 894

· Adams/Madison Bus Route Cost: 35,250+23,501= $58,781

· Limited cost-saving for personnel as one still needs the same number of staff, just a different location. There would be savings on transportation and utilities.

Option #6: Analyze overall personnel reductions if we do not merge any schools. How many Reduction in Force actions would be necessary to reduce the overall cost?

· approximately 25 positions $2 million / $80,000 = 25

· approximately 17 positions $1.3 million / $80,000 = 16.25

· approximately 13 positions $1 million / $80,000 = 12.5

*The District has been using attrition for the last three years due to the decline in student enrollment. Rather than RIF staff members in the last few years, the District absorbed many elementary teaching positions following the class size guidelines established by the Board

Option #7: TBD

Option #8: TBD

Tentative Timeline:

December 10, 2020, BoE Finance Subcommittee Meeting discussion

December 11, 2020, All Board of Education Members Informed Weekly Update

December 18, 2020, All Board of Education Members Informed Weekly Update

January 5, 2021, BoE Personnel, Curriculum Subcommittee Meeting

January 5, 2021, Meet with Lake/Osgood Staff - budget and personnel update.

January 5, 2021 Communication to Lake/Osgood parents regarding Jan. Board meeting

January 7, 2021, BoE Finance Subcommittee Meeting

January 7, 2021 Meeting with Lake/Osgood Families via Zoom Webinar - NPPS Administration @ 6:00 p.m.

January 11, 2021 Board of Education Meeting

January 12-29, 2021 Meeting with Lake/Osgood Families . . . Zoom Webinar . . . TBD

February 2, 2021, BoE Personnel, Curriculum Subcommittee Meeting

February 4, 2021, BoE Finance Subcommittee Meeting

February 8, 2021 Board of Education Meeting

Please submit your ideas at https://www.nppsd.org/vnews/display.v/ART/5ff62c472af43?in_archive=1.

You are what makes North Platte a great place to live, learn, and grow. As always, if you have specific questions about your student/s, please reach out to their teachers or building administration.

Welcome Back,

Dr. Ron Hanson, Superintendent

North Platte Public Schools

As I reflect back on one semester of learning, I am really glad that the district has repurposed the former Buffalo Elementary building to become the Buffalo Early Learning Center. In a short time, this building has really become a hub for exciting things to enrich the district’s youngest learners. This building is home to three full-day sections of Bullpup Preschool as well as two Head Start classrooms. The Early Development Network and the Early Childhood Special Education offices are located here. It has been nice to have one location where staff can collaborate and work together to provide a quality early childhood experience. This center also has space to provide early childhood trainings for the community. A quality early childhood experience is so instrumental in the brain development of young children, and I truly feel that students are receiving this at the Buffalo Early Learning Center and all of our Bullpup Preschool locations throughout the district. It is amazing to me to see the progress that all of these students have made in one semester. The teachers do a great job of providing hands-on engaging activities for the students to participate in. Social emotional development is so huge at this age, and the teachers have really strived to provide quality language rich activities that work on developing these skills.

One of the things that the preschool teachers have really collaborated on is building an Outdoor Classroom at the Buffalo Early Learning Center. An outdoor classroom is a research based approach that takes learning to the outdoors and really allows young children to engage in a variety of different play activities expanding their critical thinking and problem solving skills.

We are building the outdoor classroom in phases, and the first phase of this was completed in October. The 3 Bullpup preschool teachers, Head Start staff, along with their families, and students from the high school shop class and skills USA along with the district maintenance staff all worked together to build the first phase of this outdoor classroom. We plan on building more sections in the spring and involving students from FFA at the high school. The students absolutely love the outdoor classroom section of the playground, and it is amazing to me to see all the great learning opportunities that take place in this section each and every day. I look out at the outdoor classroom with pride because this area of the playground has come so far in a short period of time, and it is great to see what can be accomplished when people work together.

I truly am looking forward to next semester and the great learning opportunities that will take place at the Buffalo Early Learning Center.

Peggy Romshek, Director of Special Education and Early Childhood

North Platte, Neb. – Due to the Coronavirus Pandemic, North Platte Public Schools (NPPS) has adapted Kindergarten and Bullpup Preschool Registration. Online registration is now open at https://bit.ly/NPPSRegistration.

In addition to online registration, NPPS will offer in-person assistance during the week of January 11-14, 2021, from 10:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.

Due to COVID-19, we will host all in-person registration at the McKinley Education Center on the following dates.

January 11, 2021 – A-G

January 12, 2021 – H-N

January 13, 2021 – O-U

January 14, 2021 – V-Z and Anyone still needing assistance

These sessions are scheduled using the student's last name and are limited to 2 persons per household.

Please contact Connie at the District welcome center with any registration or enrollment questions at welcomecenter@nppsd.org or (308) 696-3310.

Buenos dias a todos,

Comparta esta información con sus familiares, amigos y vecinos ...

NPPS - Registro de jardín de infantes

North Platte, Neb. - Debido a la pandemia de coronavirus, las Escuelas Públicas de North Platte (NPPS) han adaptado el registro para kindergarten y preescolar Bullpup. El registro en línea ya está abierto en https://bit.ly/NPPSRegistration .

Además del registro en línea, NPPS ofrecerá asistencia en persona durante la semana de 11-14 de enero de 2021, de 10:00 a.m. a 6:00 p.m.

Debido a COVID-19, organizaremos todas las inscripciones en persona en el Centro de Educación McKinley en las siguientes fechas.

11 de enero de 2021 - AG

12 de enero de 2021 - HN

13 de enero de 2021 - OU

14 de enero de 2021: VZ y cualquier persona que todavía necesite ayuda

Estas sesiones se programan utilizando el apellido del estudiante y están limitadas a 2 personas por hogar.

Comuníquese con Connie en el centro de bienvenida del distrito con cualquier pregunta de inscripción o inscripción en welcomecenter@nppsd.org o (308) 696-3310.

Have you moved to a new location or have a different phone number? Did your household membership change?

We now have "Self-Serve" in the Parent Portal.

What this means is you as parents and guardians of North Platte Public School students can make change requests through your parent portal account for address information, demographic data, and family information. This is a convenient way for you to keep your household information current to avoid missing any communication from your student’s teacher, principal, or the district office. These requests are then processed and updated by the IC system administrator at McKinley

You can find these features under "MORE" in the menu.

If you have not signed up for a Parent Portal account, you can send an email to welcomecenter@nppsd.org and include your

Student(s) name(s)

birthdate(s)

grade(s)

school(s) they are attending

As soon as this information is confirmed you will receive your Activation Key number and instructions explaining how to set up your account, via email.

There are other convenient and cool features coming to Parent Portal.

Learn more at:

https://www.infinitecampus.com/audience/parents-students

Kids Klub staff would like to take this opportunity to thank you all for your patience and understanding this year.

Your unending support of our program is greatly appreciated.

We look forward to the future and cannot wait for you to see the exciting things we have in store for your children.

We wish each and every one of you a Happy New Year!

Carrie Lienemann & The Kids Klub Team

Just wanted to give you all a heads up (in case you were unaware) Eagle Communications, The Voice of the Dawgs, with Sports Director Kyle LaBoria and News Director Scott Carlson is video streaming ALL of the North Platte High School games this year.

To View The Schedule or Stream Visit: https://northplattepost.com/category/live-streams

We are happy to share with our North Platte Public Schools community the release of our updated mobile app. The app is designed to get quick access to district and school information, news and events. You can access the new mobile app in both the Apple App Store and Google Play store. Simply search for "NPPSD" in either store. -- Brian Tegtmeier, Director of Technology.

NPPS Mobile App