BY KARISSA MILLER

The Iredell-Statesville Schools Board of Education is required to have a mental health policy in place for next school year under Senate Bill 476.

I-SS Executive Director of Student Support Services Kelly Marcy will review the district’s draft plan with the school board on Monday during its Committee of the Whole meeting.

The meeting is open to the public and will take place at the Career Academy and Technical School, located at 350 Old Murdock Road in Troutman, at 6 p.m.

According to Marcy, the plan must be in place soon so that the district can fully execute and deploy the required measures.

Under this new law, the plan has to include a mental health training program for staff, suicide reporting protocol, threat assessment protocol and a curriculum for each grade level.

I-SS has been taking proactive steps to prevent student depression and anxiety and create avenues to address these issues and other topics.

However, one of the ongoing challenges for I-SS has been having a reliable revenue stream to hire additional staff, such as, school nurses and counselors, needed to address mental health.

At this time, no additional funding to fulfill this legislative requirement has been provided by state lawmakers.

Also, during the meeting, the board will:

• Hear a presentation on the 2021-2022 Alternative School’s Accountability Option plan;
• Review mobile device management providers and a recommendation for device refresh;
• Review a purchase of iPad for elementary for 2021-2022 school year;
• Approve a 21st century summer mini-grant;
• Review the 2021-2022 school nutrition bid;,
• Hear a presentation on PayK12 Ticket tracker software;
• Hear a presentation on Integrated Space program;
• Review the personnel report of late hire contract renewals;
• Discuss the laptop purchase for CCTL;
• Hear a presentation on the Enterprise Fleet Management proposal; and
• Review budget amendments and continuation budget resolution