Southwest Dubois County School Board meeting: Middle school has new principal

Southwest School Superintendent Mike Eineman acknowledged in Thursday night’s school board meeting that they have some work to do to get their graduation rate up.

The numbers were released on Wednesday by the Indiana Department of Education and show that Southwest Schools has a graduation rate of 84.1 percent –  the lowest of the four school systems in Dubois County.

Eineman said during the board meeting that they normally range between 82 to 88 percent, but he expressed his desire to increase the rate.  “We’re going to try to improve on anything that we can,” he explaind. “You know we have our alternative school and that has helped us tremendously. We just have to…do some things to entice kids to stay in…school a bit longer.”

During the meeting it was mentioned that Southridge Middle School Assistant Principal Annette Altmeyer will become the new principal of Southridge Middle School at the end of this school year.

Altmeyer has lived in Huntingburg for over 20 years and was hired a year ago.  She was a 7th grade math teacher at Heritage Hills Middle School for 21 years.  Altmeyer’s enthusiasm for middle school students and her work is captivating. “I love middle school – I’m completely a middle school person,” she said.

She and her husband Jeff have two children, one in middle school, the other in high school at Southridge.

Current Middle School principal Al Mihajlovitz will move into an administrative role at the School Corporation offices and will continue to direct the transportation program.

Mihajlovitz says that he has been planning for this for some time now. “The intent for me was to kind of transition out – help some at the central office with transportation and some other things that Mr. Eineman would see fit for me to do,” he said.

Mihajlovitz admits that he is not yet ready to retire because he still enjoys his work with students and helping them reach their education goals.

Eineman said that he is excited about the move and says that the transition is made easier because the change is with existing staff members, not outside personnel.

The board has not voted on the personnel moves yet but the changes will come before them in their May agenda.

The school board passed the 2014 – 15 Student handbook without the addition of the standards for athletics and extracurricular activities.  Eineman said that he would consult with High School Principal Kelly Murphy to amend the new code into the handbook by May’s board meeting.

Three resignations in the sports programs were passed by the board:

Southridge High School Girls Golf Coach, Philip Olinger; Southridge Middle School 7th Grade Boys Basketball Coach, Steve Winkler; and Southridge High School Basketball JV Coach, Craig Denu.  All three resignations were effective immediately.

Finally, the board passed a motion to enter into a contract with Five Star Technologies to manage the school corporation’s technology needs. The goal is to have the company make recommendations on what is needed to enhance the educational process throughout the schools and manage the systems.