The Blue Earth Area BPA Chapter’s treasurer, Makenzie Benschoter, makes a point during a presentation at the Blue Earth Area School Board meeting last Monday night, March 11. BPA Chapter advisor Holly Vogltance is shown listening to the presentation in the back right. The students are having another big year.

Members of the Blue Earth Area School Board heard an update from the BEA Business Professionals of America Chapter on their continued growth and accomplishments.

Three of the four senior officers of the BEA BPA were at the School Board meeting on Monday, March 11 to present the update to the board.

Kyla Roiger is the president of BEA BPA, Taylor Klabunde is the secretary and Makenzie Benschoter is the treasurer and all three gave presentations to the board. BPA vice president Bailee Burns was unable to attend the meeting.

The officers reported that the local BPA group recently had its 53 members go to Rochester and compete in the Regional BPA Conference and 47 of them qualified to continue on to the State BPA Conference in Minneapolis, which is set for March 14-16.

From there, the BEA BPA hopes to have a large group qualify to head to Nationals, which is set for May 10-14 in Chicago.

The three BPA officers said there is a lot of enthusiasm for BPA at the school. It is also a lot of work to prepare for the competitions.

The three girls said they spend a lot of time practicing for the various areas of competition and support each other while they are preparing.

They also explained that they receive other help from the community. For instance, for the medical tech part of the competition they sometimes receive help from staff at United Hospital District in Blue Earth.

BPA advisor, BEA teacher Holly Vogltance, also told the BEA Board that she is pleased with the rapid growth of the BEA BPA Chapter over just the past couple of years.

“There are a lot of different avenues the students can pursue in BPA competition,” she said. “There is something to interest everyone.”

In other business at Monday’s meeting, the BEA School Board:

• Heard a report from the Facilities Committee concerning their meeting with ISG Engineering about all the aspects of a potential new K-6 building.

The board then decided to have a work session about the possible new school on May 1, at 5:30 p.m.

The plan is still to have the question of a new school on the ballot this November.

• Heard reports from the principals that covered topics such as having Kindergarten Roundup on March 22, the Science Fair on Thursday, March 14, and offering Second Chance Breakfasts in the K-7 building.

That breakfast service has been offered for four weeks and is having as many as 100 students per day taking advantage of it.

It is a free service to the students.

• Heard an update from superintendent Mandy Fletcher which included a review of some of the proposed bills in this legislative session which could affect school districts.

She also gave an update on staffing for the next school year.

“You can see on your agenda that we are hiring an ELA teacher, a position we could not fill last year, as well as an accountant,” Fletcher said. “We will continue to monitor our student numbers, staff retirements to see what our staffing needs will be for next year.”

She added that the administrators had been interviewing some candidates for other positions.

• Learned that the FFA Donkey Basketball event was a big success. Proceeds were donated to the Food Shelf.

• Approved the revised budget for 2024-2025. The budget was presented nine months ago and needed to be revised for a variety of reasons, including updated enrollment numbers.

• Approved the Spring Coaches list.

• Approved the agreement with the Blue Earth Diamonds for preparing the softball diamonds for practice and games.

• Accepted donations to the Bucc-y Backpack Program from Winnebago Manufacturing and the Blue Earth Kiwanis Club.

• Approved several personnel changes including: hiring Maija Whitefeather as a high school ELA teacher and James Mewhirter as a custodian; the resignation of Mariah Vaughn as a paraprofessional and Gene Engelking as a custodian; retirement for Jody Eckhardt as an administrative assistant (after 40 years) and Kay Sonnicksen as a speech/language pathologist (after 37 years); an extended leave of absence for Patti Lindsey, high school counselor; a contract for Ashley Olson as staff accountant.