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Orono Public School District board meeting, date not confirmed yet

1 h 15 min

This board doesn’t post agenda times. Click a board member to jump to where they first speak; we list only members whose voice our check named. Video length 1 h 15 min.

  1. Who spoke · first speaks at
What happened

What happened at this meeting

Orono board takes up arena land conveyance and ground lease, hears summer project updates 9:05

  • District staff gave a summer construction update covering parking lots, water leak repairs at Schumann and planned projects for the school year. 9:18
  • The board held a roll call vote on a resolution to accept conveyance of real property from the Orono Ice Arena, and the chair then called for a motion to approve a ground lease and recreational facility cooperative agreement. 20:51
Item by item (8)
  1. Opening and consent agenda 0:01
    • Sarah Borchers said no one signed up for community members' questions and comments, and no changes to the agenda were requested. 0:01
    • The consent agenda included accepting donations totaling $743,812.06, approving the Director of Business Services contract for '26-'28 and wage adjustments for substitutes, proctors, students, casual employees and athletic coaches. 0:58
  2. Superintendent's report 2:44
    • The superintendent said Community Education reported more than 7,500 summer enrollments in 532 camps and classes, preschool through adults. 3:47
    • The superintendent said 374 students were registered for fall sports, all teachers return August 25th and students return beginning September 1st. 4:46
  3. Board member comments 6:07
    • Wendy Lundsgaard said MSBA resolutions are due September 23rd and that the district is looking at several hundred thousand dollars in special education cross-subsidy reductions. 6:40
    • Wendy Lundsgaard said the permanent school fund would add approximately $36 per student but would not cover the reductions. 7:43
    • Gavin Tempero said the special education cross-subsidy means the district pays out of the general fund, pulling funds from other places. 8:16
  4. Construction projects update 9:05
    • The staff member said work on the Schumann water leak would likely continue for the first couple months of the school year and that bids were put out for a Discovery Center kitchen remodel. 10:25
    • A district staff member said a contribution through the Orono Foundation funded a college and career center and a high school science room renovation, and that more parking lot improvements are planned next year. 13:24
    • Asked about the tennis courts, the staff member said the district still hoped to have them completed late this fall. 19:18
  5. Arena land conveyance resolution 20:51
    • The superintendent said property adjacent to the current hockey arena would be donated from the arena board to the school district, and the conveyance agreement was vetted by the district attorney. 20:59
    • A speaker raised whether to abstain from the votes on the arena items. 23:49
  6. Arena ground lease agreement 24:31
    • The superintendent said the existing ground lease had expired and the new lease is generally a restatement of current lease language. 20:59
    • A district staff member said the district expected to have the agreement signed within the next week or two. 23:29
  7. Summer technology update 25:55
    • The director of technology said the district sent 10 teachers to the AI for Minnesota summit through the Educator Excellence Grant and held a 4-hour cybersecurity tabletop exercise in July. 27:10
    • A technology staff member said grades 9 through 12 now have enforced multi-factor authentication, and another staff member said summer interns scanned over 1,400 Chromebooks. 36:26
    • Asked how AI could be incorporated in classrooms, the director of technology said research on student learning is thin but consistently shows an impact on teacher time. 1:06:42
  8. Next meeting and adjournment 1:14:39
    • The next regular meeting was set for Monday, September 14th, 2026, at 7:00 PM in the district office. 1:14:47

Written by software from the meeting's transcript and checked sentence by sentence against it.

What was said

What board members said, in order

I may jump in. Just what we all know what cross-subsidy for special education means, but to our viewers in the room and the viewers at home, that means we have to pay out of the general fund to cover that. So that means we're pulling funds from other places.Gavin Tempero · Director8:16
Other meetings

Other meetings of this board

Video: posted by the district as “Orono School Board Meeting 8/17/26”