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School board reviews audit, OKs new student activities

By Susanna Meyer 7 min read

The Marshalltown Community School District board of education had a busy agenda at the regularly scheduled meeting Monday night, which included a review of the financial statement audit for fiscal year 2021 and the approval of four new student activities and increased meal prices.

All school districts in Iowa are required to undergo an annual financial statement audit. While they generally aim to have audits complete prior to tax season, an extension was necessary due to staffing shortages, so it was presented on Monday.

Kristi Wick with certified public accounting firm Hogan-Hansen joined the meeting via Zoom to go over some of the specifics of the audit for the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2021 with the board members.

Wick highlighted the independent auditor's report, which showed the firm's opinion on the financial statements they reviewed and concluded that the reviewed financial statements "presented fairly."

"That is the best possible opinion we can offer," Wick said.

Wick went on to discuss the MCSD's general fund, and she calculated about 67 days of expenditures in the fund balance at the end of fiscal year 2021. While she said that was a healthy position to be in, COVID related funding could have something to do with it.

"COVID has changed things a lot. It's skewed a lot of things, and so while that's very healthy, I wouldn't -- don't get too comfortable in that position. COVID provided a lot of federal funding and a lot of revenue. It messed with expenditures and decreased expenditures, and also there's still some unfilled positions in your district as well," she said.

The schedule of findings and questioned costs did not find any instances of noncompliance, but under internal control deficiencies, there was an issue with the segregation of duties -- a repeat finding from the previous audit.

"It's not an uncommon finding for some school districts in Iowa. But basically, just with having some open positions in the business office, the duties, the internal controls, all the day to day tasks aren't truly able to be divided up among staff to provide the most effective internal control system," Wick said.

Wick said the uses of COVID relief funds and child nutrition funds were also audited in order to make sure transactions were appropriate for the purposes of the funds. No issues were found on that front.

"That's pretty amazing considering the significance especially of the COVID funds. There's just so many compliance rules and regulations that have to be followed there, so that's really great," Wick said.

Board member Leah Stanley asked what the best course of action would be to combat the segregation of duties problem, and Wick said the best way would be to hire more people. She then suggested strategic planning could also help.

Director of Business Operations Paulette Newbold said they were working on outsourcing certain tasks from the business office to the building level to help with that problem. Superintendent Theron Schutte commended the finance team for their efforts.

"I am very confident under Paulette's leadership that with the staff we have, whether we're fully staffed or not, the critical functions are happening as they should be, and that we will get to a point where hopefully we can delegate some of the responsibilities to the building level to help ease that," Schutte said. "It's not an excuse, but it's a reality that most school districts do not meet that condition based on the number of people that it would take to satisfy that."

The school board heard a proposal from multiple MCSD staff members regarding four new student activities -- girls wrestling, eSports, and two Career Technical Student Organizations (CTSOs) including FFA and Future Business Leaders of America.

Ryan Isgrig, the Marshalltown High School athletic and activities director, sought approval for a girl's wrestling program for MHS as well as Miller Middle School. In February, the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union announced that girls wrestling would be sanctioned.

"I'd say there's a lot of momentum right now behind this movement and, as we know, wrestling is extremely popular in Iowa, right, and with our new facility (and) our new wrestling room I think it would be great to have a Bobcat girls wrestling program," Isgrig said.

The program would also be the third available winter girls' sport after bowling and basketball.

MHS Dean of Students Dan Terrones asked for the board's approval to add an eSports team to the available activities at MHS, both at the competitive level and the club level, and join the Iowa High School eSports Association.

Terrones said the popularity of eSports has grown exponentially in recent years, and it's now not only a good sport to have but also a viable career field. Marshalltown Community College is now offering an associate's degree program in eSports.

He also felt it would be a good way to draw more students to school activities.

"So, the excitement of engaging more students who have not connected with traditional extracurricular opportunities, the addition of a new and exciting career pathway for our students and the additional connections we will make with MCC makes our request seem timely and important for our students at Marshalltown High School," Terrones said.

Finally, MHS principal Jacque Wyant and Curriculum and Professional Development Leader Jenny Allen discussed the proposed CTSO programs -- FFA and Future Business Leaders of America.

These four activities were approved for the 2022-2023 school year 6-0 with Bonnie Lowry absent.

Director of Food Service Lynn Large also discussed the 2022-2023 school year meal prices at the Monday night meeting.

Since the onset of the pandemic in 2020, schools were able to operate under the Summer Meal Program which allowed students to have meals at no cost, but that funding will be discontinued for the upcoming year. Thus, schools will go back to operating under the National School Lunch Program.

Large said students would go back to paying for their meals, with low-income families receiving free and reduced cost meals if they qualify. She said they still intend to participate in the Community Eligibility Provision, meaning PK-6 students would still receive free meals. In seventh grade, however, students would have to purchase them.

Because of a nationwide surge in food costs, Large requested a cost increase for meals for students who do not qualify for reduced rate meals. Breakfast would increase by 25 cents, lunch by 10 cents and single purchases of milk would increase by five cents.

The changes were approved unanimously by present board members.

In other business, the board:

• Saw the HumanEX culture survey results.

• Approved a preschool curriculum recommendation from Director of Instruction Shauna Smith.

• Approved the summer 2022 summer projects proposal from Director of Buildings and Grounds Todd Goulding in the amount of $470,000.

• Approved the purchase of new Ava Security Cameras for Miller Middle School in the amount of $45,799.76.

• Approved a Memorandum of Agreement with the Marshalltown Education Association and the Marshalltown Education Association supplemental pay schedule recommendation.

• Recognized 53 Marshalltown High School students from the Class of 2022 who were recognized with the Seal of Biliteracy.

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Contact Susanna Meyer at 641-753-6611 or

smeyer@timesrepublican.com.

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