The 2025-26 fall semester is off to a good start, and the Oct. 21 Board of Education meeting shines a light on many new ideas and resolutions. The school board came together to discuss new facilities updates. Many updates have been made in terms of rentals and usage abilities.

Dr. Travis McGuire brought forward a conversation about the 2024-2025 Facility Rental Program Review and Performance Metrics. This program marks the first anniversary of the overhaul that was implemented previously, in Fall 2024.

The restructuring of the new facilities consisted of adding and creating new categories specifically for feeder programs. Essentially, this results in a lower cost for rentals and increases the level of in-district participation to at least 60%.

McGuire discussed how the total revenue has increased by an outstanding 137%. Surging from $128,224 in 2024 to a superlative $308,908 in 2025. There was also an increase in rental days by 34.7% due to the changes in application windows. For auditorium rentals, the window dropped from 4 to 2, while for other facilities, the window dropped from 4 to 3. “It creates a larger window of time for people to make requests, and they don’t have to do it as often,” said Dr. Hank Thiele.

To assist with the offset of local operational costs, there has been an increase of 250% in the total amount being directly returned to the buildings. Climbing from $8,538 to $29,887.

“Rentals allow the community to use spaces they helped fund through local property taxes. These are often opportunities for future students and families to be in the schools before they are students here. It helps future students see our schools as theirs and helps them feel like they belong here once they arrive,” said Thiele.