Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel issued an opinion on Aug. 1 that prohibits school districts from employing teachers or other school staff as armed security guards.
Twelve school districts have obtained licenses from the Arkansas Board of Private Investigators and Private Security Agencies to permit them to train, license and arm school employees. But McDaniel’s opinion states that the Board is not authorized to license a political subdivision such as a school district.
One of the districts, Clarksville, has already begun a $50,000 training program on firearms for its staff.
The Arkansas State Police administers licenses approved by the Arkansas Board of Private Investigators, but a spokesman told The Arkansas News that the agency has decided to put on hold all applications by “nonconventional” entities as well as schools.
On Aug. 2, Congressman Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) introduced legislation that would define full-time employees as working at least 40 hours a week as opposed to the current minimum of 30 noted in the Affordable Care Act, which addresses a growing concern within this legislation, NSTA reported. The currently law defines a full-time employee as working 30 hours per week. NSTA said Lipinski’s proposal would change the law to define a full-time employee as working 40 hours per week.
NSTA explained that the proposed new definition is important as it “delineates, among other criteria, the threshold at which an employer must offer health care coverage to employees.” Lipinski’s bill, HR 2988, or “Forty Hours is Full Time,” is companion legislation to a bipartisan bill that was previously introduced by Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.).
NSTA added that it remained “hopeful” the legislation would move forward because of support of the proposal by members of both parties and major business groups in Washington.
Last month, the school board for Hoover (Ala.) City Schools voted to end regular-education school busing at the start of the 2014-2015 school year to save $2.5 million. And parents are not happy. Many of those parents attended a school board meeting Thursday night to voice their displeasure.
“You and the board are on the verge of destroying one of the best school systems in the state of Alabama,” AL.com quoted one Spain Park High School mother, who was addressing Superintendent Andy Craig.
The district said increasing student enrollment and “sharply” declining revenues have “diluted the funding model and eroded the district’s investment capacity in core teaching and learning.” The district added that per-student revenues have fallen more than 17 percent, to $11,356 from $13,715, since 2008. As a result the “tough choice” of cutting transportation was made. The district will continue to operate special needs busing.
The School Bus Safety Company posted a new video on its website that promotes its Student Safety Program course in an effort to reduce student fatalities at the school bus stop from Twelve to Zero. Most kids killed in the so-called school bus “danger zone” — the 10-foot perimeter around the vehicle where students are most frequently injured and killed during loading or unloading — were 7 years old or younger, says the SBSC.
The fourth Safe Routes to School National Conference is set to kick off in Sacramento, California. Since 2007, the biannual National Conference has brought Safe Routes to School champions together to share success stories, learn from one another and chart the course for the future.
