Vassalboro school board hears positive reports for end of year

Vassalboro Community School (contributed photo)

by Mary Grow

At their June 18 meeting, Vassalboro School Board members heard positive reports about the end of the current school year and continued planning for the next one.

Principal Ira Michaud said end-of-school events, including field trips, the spring concert, a field day and the eighth-grade promotion exercises, went very well. He and Superintendent Alan Pfeiffer thanked multiple non-school people who helped.

Michaud said three weeks of summer school are scheduled beginning July 8. Classes will run Mondays through Thursdays.

Pfeiffer, speaking for Finance Director Paula Pooler, said the 2023-24 budget is expected to be in the black when the fiscal year ends June 30.

Later in the meeting, board members gave final approval to the 2024-25 school budget that Vassalboro voters approved at their June 3 town meeting and re-approved in a June 11 referendum, in the amount of $9,522,114.82.

Board members started spending some of the money: they authorized Pfeiffer to negotiate and sign a letter of intent with Energy Management Consultants, Inc., of Portland “to perform an energy audit and HVAC [heating, ventilation and air conditioning] infrastructure analysis of the Vassalboro Community School,” for not more than $15,000.

Pfeiffer expects the work to extend over several years and to cover multiple aspects of energy use at VCS. The first changes might be made as soon as the next school year, he said.

School board members plan no July meeting. They voted to move their regular meeting night from the third Tuesday of the month (which ran into conflicts this past year) to the second Tuesday, and scheduled their next meeting for Tuesday evening, Aug. 13.