Please see the following Guest Commentary from Dr. Kirk Henwood, the Superintendent of the South Routt School District.

Dear South Routt,

As we reach the holiday season and a much-deserved break for our students, teachers, and staff. I wanted to share a word or two of gratitude of my own.

 

I am so grateful, along with everyone at South Routt School District, that South Routt County voters chose overwhelmingly to vote in the renewal of our mill levy override early last month. Your decision at the ballot box allows us to continue our quest to be the best small school district in Colorado—a journey I feel we’re making incredible progress on every day.

 

I wanted to not only offer my enormous gratitude, but also to talk you through just how your tax dollars will continue to work on your behalf, thanks to your choice on Election Day.

 

Thanks to you, we’ll be able to…

 

• Continue paying our teachers and staff a highly competitive wage. This is the primary use of these funds. We’re so blessed with incredible teachers at SOROCO. These high-quality, highly invested educators are among the most important ways we create learning environments that foster so much student success. It’s how we achieved the honor of being a district of distinction three years in a row.
• Continue investing in great support for those teachers. We have wonderful staff and administration in this district, who are responsible for taking care of business so that teachers can teach. I’m so proud to work with this group of incredible people, who see the mission of educating students at the highest level and live it every day.
• Continue to fix and improve our facilities. Although the MLO funding isn’t for facilities or capital expenditures, personnel costs make up the vast majority of our budgeted spending, and being able to pay our people with the help of the voters, we’re able to focus other funding on critical needs in the buildings where our students learn.
• It’s hard sometimes to think about growth when we’re doing well academically, but the absolute truth is we have work to do. We always do. We’re not satisfied. It takes investment to grow—we all know it takes good feed to get good livestock, and it takes good money to get good results, too. We want to be the best small school district in Colorado. That doesn’t come without constant improvement. Thanks to you, that’s coming. Count on it.

 

In the coming weeks, we’ll be spending some energy getting more specific with just how exactly this money gets used and how your tax dollars work to grow South Routt kids. Remember, growing South Routt kids means growing South Routt as a community. Our students and staff are a good investment, and thank you for choosing to do that this past Election Day.

 

Sincerely,

Dr. Kirk Henwood

Superintendent, South Routt School District