School Board Organizes for 2024 at First Meeting of Year
The East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) Board of Education had its first meeting of the winter semester and 2024 calendar year on Monday (Jan. 8). The brief half-hour meeting welcomed back board members from break and featured several key announcements introducing changes and developments both to the board and the school district.
Chris Martin is elected school board president.
The first item on the agenda was the annual election of school board officers. While most positions were filled by the respective position’s incumbent, former trustee Chris Martin was voted unanimously to be the new president. Martin was appointed to the board in February 2023 after the resignation of Debbie Walton. He takes over for Terah Chambers who will now serve as a trustee. Incumbents returning to their positions until 2025 are Vice President Elizabeth Lyons, Treasurer Kath Edsall and Secretary Tali Faris-Hylen.
“I would just like to say thank you to all of you for giving me an opportunity to serve in this role. I am really excited for what we are going to accomplish in the next year,” Martin said to the board.
The student representative reported on the new Youth Commission.
Student Representative Holyn Walsh addressed the board. Among her announcements was a statement of congratulations to the East Lansing High School (ELHS) Varsity Boys Basketball team who recently beat Grand Blanc 53-38. She also reminded the board that Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (Jan 10-12) are half days because of final exams.
Walsh wrapped up her announcements by debriefing about the first-ever meeting of the East Lansing Youth Commission held Monday (Jan. 8), prior to the school board meeting.
“We discussed several suggestions aimed at improving student life and we noticed that many of our recommendations fell within your [school board] jurisdiction,” she said. “We thought that it could be beneficial for members of the commission to create reports for me to bring in periodically.”
The board accepted the proposal, expanding Walsh’s role in future meetings to report suggestions to the board as a representative of the Youth Commission.
Action item discussion focused on the bond proposal.
The board moved on to its action items, where it focused on details of the bond proposal to be voted on May 7. East Lansing voters will vote for or against the bond proposal, which will allow for several renovation projects to take place within ELPS, with a focus on MacDonald Middle School (MMS), the high school and central administration facilities.
During their discussion, board members stressed this proposal will not raise the City of East Lansing tax rate and would be factored into the current budget to be paid off in nine years.
Proposed renovations include: upgraded door hardware allowing building doors to be locked from the inside; HVAC work at both MMS and ELHS; new carpet in MMS; new security measures and a new high school administration office to allow for improved visibility and flow of guest traffic to the school; and a new, almost 10,000-square-foot administration building to be built at an un-utilized plot of land on the border of East Lansing and Meridian Township (the land is owned by ELPS).
The meeting concluded with a round of committee reports; no committee representatives had announcements to make. Martin announced committees would finish being assigned at the next meeting.
Video of the Monday meeting is available here. The school board will next meet at 7 p.m. Jan. 23.