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<b>First Posted:</b> 3/4/2008<br><br>By Mark Guydish mguydish@www.timesleader.comEducation Reporter 


DALLAS TWP. &amp;ndash; Dallas School Board members only took one formal action Monday night &amp;ndash; to appoint Dave Smith as high school marching band director for $4,182 next year &amp;ndash; but spent considerable time discussing future actions.
Colleen Slocum from Xerox presented a proposal to put two new &amp;ldquo;multipurpose&amp;rdquo; machines in each of the four schools and a &amp;ldquo;light production&amp;rdquo; machine in the administration copy room at a total monthly lease of $5,165. Slocum said the new machines would interface better with district computers than current ones, and that the company would include &amp;ldquo;Docushare&amp;rdquo; software at no charge that would make it easy to scan and store paper documents onto computers. 
The offer includes nearly $51,000 paid to the district to offset the cost of cutting short the current lease, which runs to February 2009. 
Business Manager Grant Palfey said he believes the district could keep the current equipment and use it for document scanning to reduce paper archives until the lease expires. The district would still get the $51,000 from Xerox.
Slocum noted the price does not include staples in the machines, which are covered under the current lease, and could run as high as $440 a month. 
In other action, Superintendent Frank Galicki noted that the district has sent a letter home to parents of Dallas Elementary School students asking for volunteers willing to transfer to Wycallis Elementary, where 10 additional classrooms are expected to be finished by the start of next school year. Galicki said the district wants about 100 students to transfer.
Galicki, Palfey and Assistant Superintendent Paul Reinert spent most of the meeting going over a &amp;ldquo;goals update&amp;rdquo; that outlined numerous changes they are implementing &amp;ndash; or hope to implement &amp;ndash; in the district, including the creation of an Education Leadership Foundation, a non-profit corporation that would raise money for district use. Galicki said the group had met with a representative from the Mid-Atlantic Consortium of Education Foundations to discuss ways to start a local foundation, and that he hoped to have that person speak to the board as well.
Other topics the trio covered included making schools and curriculum more adaptable by putting more text and course work on student laptops accessible via the district wireless network; integrating career decision-making into the curriculum, including an &amp;ldquo;electronic portfolio&amp;rdquo; of student work and interests that would start in kindergarten and follow each student through graduation; helping more teachers earn National Board Certification for teachers; and possibly opening a wellness and day care center on the district campus.

    

Mark Guydish, a Times Leader staff writer, may be reached at 829-7161

Dallas School Board ponders copier choices