UP CONCERNED CITIZENS

Here is a list Upper Perk District needs that were sacrificed for a long time after the large expense of the Upper Perk turf field installation:

Technology

• Recently added one to one computer initiative for the MS and HS and 3-1 in elementary.

• A 30 year old financial system has just recently been replaced.

• Student software has just recently been replaced.

• Just recently hired a new designer to revamp the UPSD website.

• The phone systems are now being replaced. They were so outdated that additional phones needed to be purchased on Ebay because the vendor no longer sold the units that were compatible with our server.

Curriculum

• Advanced program classes have recently been added at high school.

• ELA (english, language, arts) and math have recently been added at the elementary level.

• Recently finished implementing the new CPM Math program that our district was behind on compared to the surrounding districts.

• Last year the Humanities program (HS) was finally updated after 20 years.

Program Cuts

• French has been cut.

• Family Consumer Science has been cut.

• Latin is currently on the chopping block.

Books

• Textbooks were 15 to 20 years old and are now on a replacement cycle.

• Novels were so old, they were falling apart. They have just recently been replaced.

Salary Freezes

• Teachers: In 2014/2015 there was no movement on salary schedule.

• There was a decrease in the supplemental salary schedule from 2013 to 2016.

Tuition Reimbursement Cuts

• The contract shows that classes that qualified for credits in the past are no longer qualifying.

Sports - See athletic director budget request (pdf download) of April 11th.  

• Scoreboards for football stadium, baseball field, gymnasium and the pool - Note the request to replace stadium scoreboards that were so old the technology is no longer supported by the vendor and replacement parts are being bought on Ebay.

• Uniforms – Uniform purchases have been put off for many years. In addition to the request, the director told a story of how the track team had to swap uniforms in order for a 3 member team to have the same uniform for a relay race.
  The soccer uniforms are so old the numbers are peeling. Some student have blue numbers, some have yellow numbers, and some have one yellow and one blue number. ALL the uniforms are so old it’s embarrassing. Uniforms need to be replaced for both boy and girl teams for soccer, basketball, cross country, tennis, baseball and wrestling.

• The Indian, Tribe and pool sound systems need to be replaced.

• The golf cart used for moving equipment and emergency situations is at the end
  of it's life expectancy.