Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
MENTONE - The Tippecanoe Valley School Corporation Board of Trustees was introduced to several new staff members and heard an update on an artificial intelligence task force during its meeting Monday.
At the meeting, Akron Elementary School Principal Scott Sterk introduced Berklee Sutton, second-grade teacher; and Brittany Corothers, ECA treasurer, to the board. Scott Sayger, seventh- and eighth-grade English Language Arts teacher; and Bella Carter, sixth-grade science teacher, were also both introduced as new hires at Tippecanoe Valley Middle School. Mandy Wilkie was unable to attend the board meeting but has been hired as the family consumer science teacher at TVMS.
In other business, TVSC Superintendent Blaine Conley said the corporation received a $10,220 Digital Learning Grant from the Indiana Department of Education. Inga Omondi, TVSC director of curriculum, instruction and assessment, said the grant would tie into the corporation's AI task force.
Omondi told the board a lot of conversations need to continue regarding AI usage. The IDOE grant will be used for one year of SchoolAI, a platform that "provides safe, classroom-ready AI where students learn within teacher-designed, guard railed experiences, and educators get real-time mastery data showing whether students are actually achieving the outcomes that matter," according to SchoolAI's website.
"The taskforce had two main objectives," said Omondi. "The first one was to investigate several platforms to see if an AI platform such as SchoolAI ... can an AI platform do the same things as other platforms we pay for. Secondly, how can we help cultivate digital citizenship within our own students? We want to teach them the right way to use technology. That piece we're still working on."
Omondi told the board they were able to reduce the number of platforms TVSC was paying for because of SchoolAI. Twenty teachers are already using the platform, with its utilization growing organically within the corporation as it hasn't been fully introduced to all staff yet.
"You can create a student space that has a lot of parameters because the teacher sets up the parameters on what it can do and what it can't do," said Omondi.
Omondi said the AI task force's goal with the grant's usage is to increase TVSC's IREAD and SAT scores. The task force consists of volunteers Omondi sought within the corporation, with next steps for the taskforce relating to policy and training for other teachers. She noted SchoolAI also keeps students' data safe.
Meagan Wilks, director of special services, also provided an update to the board on Valley Early Learning Academy recruitment. Through the new day care facility at TVSC, which will be located in the new administration building, an additional 28 seats are available for parents in need of childcare, in addition to 18 seats currently at the Mentone location.
"(The new administration building) is coming at a really great time because this past school year, we were full here at Mentone," said Wilks. "We definitely needed these seats to help our community with childcare."
Wilks said about 50% of VELA students are children of TVSC employees.
"It makes me really feel proud and great that we can provide spots to our community," said Wilks.
The board's next meeting is at 6 p.m. Monday, July 20, at the new TVSC administration building, pending its completion. An open house for the building will be held at a to-be-announced date.
