The Fountain Hills Unified School District Governing Board’s final meeting of the 2018-19 school year was held on June 26 and saw the school board (minus Vice President Dr. Wendy Barnard, who was absent from the meeting) vote on the adoption of the 2019-20 budget.

The evening began with the board voting to suspend its regular meeting and open a public hearing on the budget.

Superintendent Dr. Robert Allen gave a brief presentation on the budget, highlighting the changes he addressed in more depth during the previous school board meeting.

With no public comments and no questions from the board, the 2019-20 budget was unanimously approved by the present board members.

The budget is $10,426,358 which is down nearly $150,000 from last year’s budget of $10,569,151. The reason for the decline in funds has to do with a decline in student enrollment.

Textbooks

Along with the budget, the school board voted on the approval of a myriad of other items such as the Pickleball Club’s proposal for lighting updates and two new courts pending permits and funding.

However, only one of the items on the Board’s agenda stirred debate and that was the approval of five new textbooks for the Fountain Hills High School Spanish program.

“Descubre 1,” “Descubre 2,” “Descubre 3,” “Temas,” “AP Spanish Language and Culture,” and “AP Spanish, Language and Culture Exam Preparation,” were previously on display at the district office and received two comments from the community.

The focus of these comments was on “Descubre 1,” “Descubre 2” and “Descubre 3.” Former FHHS Spanish teacher Marilyn Buettner expressed concern that “Descubre 2” was too difficult for a Spanish 2 class and that “Descubre 3” was too simple for Spanish 3.

Current FHHS Spanish teacher, Kailani McClain, was in attendance at the meeting and explained to the board that she planned on using the “Descubre 1” and “Descubre 2” textbooks as an additional resource to pull assignments from that could be given to students who are progressing faster than their peers and need more challenging work.

McClain also explained that the “Descubre 3” textbook was simpler because Spanish 3 is taught only in Spanish and having an easier reference is important for some students.

The board was impressed with McClain’s explanation of how she planned to use the textbooks and voted to approve the textbooks.

The FHUSD Governing Board will have no meetings in July and will return with its first meeting of the 2019-20 school year on August 14.