Rib Lake reviews plans for prom, graduation
Prom and graduation will look different at Rib Lake School District this year than in the past.
Rib Lake High School principal Kirsten Budimlija presented a plan at the February 12 Rib Lake school board meeting to hold an outdoor prom on June 4. This would be the Friday after school is done for the year.
The plan would be to have catered food inside the building and then have dancing outdoors with the grand march live streamed for people to watch from home.
Budimlija said they are continuing to work on ideas for it, but wanted to bring it to the board for their blessing to continue. She said the health department has been involved in the decision making and they suggested that there be no slow dancing at the event.
District administrator Rick Cardey compared it to holding a street dance. “It could be a great night for the kids,” he said.
“I sure don’t have any problems with it,” said board member Rollie Thums.
The graduation ceremony for this year will take place on Friday, May 28 and will also occur outdoors. The plan is to start it at 6:30 p.m. and hold it in the front parking lot of the elementary school. This will allow some seating capacity while also planning to stream it online. Budimlija said the rain location would be the gym.
Cardey warned that this year’s graduation will be longer than normal since they are planning to incorporate the awards night in with the graduation ceremony rather than having it on two separate nights. “Our 39-minute graduation might go to an hour, 15 minutes,” Cardey said.
In other business, board members:
★ Approved a number of upgrades to the digital infrastructure in the school buildings to take advantage of the high-speed internet coming into the school. Cardey said the speed is throttled down about 20% for capacity with the switches and access points compared to what is coming into the building. The work will be paid upfront by the district and then be reimbursed through grant and aid funding.
★ Approved moving ahead with planning in-person summer school for next summer. Cardey said summer school has been good for academic enrichment and credit recovery for the district and they looked forward to offering it again this summer.
★ Tweaked the school calendar to have school all day on March 25 and move the half day to March 26. Cardey noted this would also work with a possible immunization clinic for teachers if the vaccine is available to the county.
★ Accepted the retirement of school nurse Judy Le-Master at the end of June and teacher Mike Wudi at the end of the school year. “What happens if we don’t approve it,” Thums asked of Wudi’s retirement.
★ Authorized Cardey to move ahead with planning the calendar for the 2021-2022 school year. The calendar is very similar to this year’s with students starting on September 1 and ending before Memorial Day. Because of how the calendar falls, it includes a vacation day on December 23 next year. Cardey noted that as in the past, there is no spring break planned.
