Aubrey ISD announced the district’s reaching the 4,500-student threshold during the school board’s Jan. 15 meeting.
During her report, Superintendent Dr. Shannon Saylor informed the board and spoke briefly on the benchmark and further stated the district’s attendance for the first semester and beginning of the second are in line with the board’s goals for the year.
“We added about 30 since the end of the last semester,” Saylor said. “I didn’t include attendance in there because it would just be for January, but I will tell you we’re at 97% for the days we returned. Ending the third six-weeks, we’re about 1.3% above what we were last year.”
Construction consultant Dr. Scott Niven returned with a look at the district’s myriad construction projects, beginning with the field house addition.
“We’re still trying to get moving, so what I have to report there is mud,” Niven said. “We’re trying to get that mucked out and dried out to get moving again, but unfortunately this time of year, it’s to be expected so you’ve just got to fight through it.”
Regarding the overall high school project, he followed up on the board’s concerns from December regarding subcontractors taking up space during pick up and drop off times.
“It’s a lot going on, a lot of logistics happening trying to keep subs out of the drives,” Niven said. “We finally got it down to where Pogue has a person stationed at the entrance during those times to stop the sub traffic from coming in and out. It’s a daily battle in regard to that.”
Board member Benton Bland asked for more information regarding drainage.
“Is it going to be functional where they can start doing the grating around the front of the school,” Bland asked. “Is that going to help with some of the water issues?”
Niven said it would. “It should push some of that water towards the retention pond,” Niven said. “There is still going to be some drainage in the front we’ll have to deal with, but you’ll see more going through that system than you’ve seen in the past.”
He further confirmed the east drive is planned for reopening by the end of February.
“We’ll hopefully have more to report next month,” Niven said.
Operations Director Matthew Gore later reported on the steps in front of Monaco Elementary, which is one of the two remaining work orders from the fall semester.
“I’m a little disappointed that this one has been out there since September,” Gore said. “They had plenty of time to do it back towards the beginning of the year, and they waited so now they’re up against temperature and weather conditions trying to put that skim coat down. The last thing you want is to put it down and have it start chipping right back up.”
