COPPERAS COVE – The Copperas Cove ISD School Board approved all items on a fast-tracked 21-point agenda Tuesday night, which culminated in an extensive discussion about cell phone use on district school campuses.
Board Chair Joan Manning was aware of this and reminded those present that board members take plenty of time to ask questions and discuss issues during the workshop sessions – the last of which took place just a day ago.
“If anyone is worried that we are a bunch of yes-men, come to the workshop and see how many questions we ask,” Manning said.
The biggest approval of the night was an agenda item: a more than $1 million agreement with the TASB Risk Management Fund for 2024-2025. The TASB website states that they are “Texas’ largest provider of risk management services to educational institutions. We are a self-insured, nonprofit risk pool of more than 1,000 public educational institutions in Texas working together to share risk, protect their resources, and succeed together.”
The second biggest item of the evening was the approval of nearly half a million dollars for an educational/residential services contract with the Autism Treatment Center for individual residential contact for students.
The $494,057.04 comes from budget funds and will provide care for a single student with special needs at the Autism Treatment Center.
Superintendent Joe Burns said public schools have an obligation to continue providing services to students regardless of their disabilities or even if they are expelled.
Burns said the nearly half-million-dollar cost of continuing to care for this student would be less than other methods of keeping them on campus.
Burns said this particular student, whose name was not disclosed, has been with the school district for “many years” and has a history of hurting and harming staff.
Burns said that at one point, seven school district employees were entitled to compensation due to the student’s behavior, which caused “multiple concussions” among employees and displayed “very aggressive” behavior.
“This is our best attempt to serve this person,” he said.
In discussing the approval of the new student handbook, Burns said the guide will include updated language regarding cell phone use in school.
“We haven’t updated our mobile phone handbook since the 2010s,” Burns said. “Mobile phone usage has evolved since then and we want to update the language in the handbook.”
The school’s previous policy — which Burns said hadn’t been enforced in years — allowed administrators to confiscate students’ cell phones and require parents to pick them up for a $15 fee. The school district reserves the right to confiscate a cell phone if a student doesn’t follow usage rules, but the $15 fee has been removed from the handbook.
Burns said cell phone use by students largely begins in middle school, and board members updated cell phone policies on campus.
Personal cell phones are allowed for safety reasons, including medical purposes. Middle school students are allowed to carry their phones visibly before school starts and must keep them out of sight until the end of the school day. High school students have more freedom – except before school, phones are allowed during lunch and recess.
Other measures approved by the Board include:
$207,875 for communities in schools
$176,113 for an interlocal agreement with the City of Copperas Cove to provide School Resource Officers at the high school
On November 5, an election ordinance for the CCISD Board of Directors was adopted.
Joint operating agreements with the Boys and Girls Club of Central Texas and the City of Copperas Cove.
