November 1, 2024 Update

Good afternoon,

Our school year has officially ended. The final act of the 2024-2025 school year occurred last night, June 9, when the Board of Education had its last meeting of the school year. The new school year officially begins July 1.

At our Board of Education meeting last night, the Board approved our final budget amendment for this school year and approved a proposed budget for 2025-2026.

Because all of us love budgeting, here are some highlights:

• 2024-2025 Final Budget amendment
  • Total revenues: $112,614,930
    • Revenues were down from our projection by $1,541,253
      • This was primarily due to the state not increasing our per pupil allocation for the 2024-2025 school year
        • Our per pupil allocation is $9,608 for 2024-2025
        • Our per pupil allocation for 2023-2024 was also $9,608
  • Total expenses: $118,565,672
    • Expenses were fairly close to our projections.
    • A planned deficit was exacerbated by the lack of an increase to our funding.
• 2025-2026 Proposed Budget
  • Projected revenues: $111,563,086
  • Projected expenses: $116,825,133
    
    

As of today, the legislature has not passed a school aid budget for 2025-2026. Historically, the Governor’s Office, the Senate, and the House pass budget proposals. Then, because each proposal is typically different, they negotiate and pass a final school aid budget.

This year that has not happened. The Governor and the Senate have passed budgets. But, the House has not as of today.

So, our district, like every district in the state does not know our level of funding for next year. Legally, school districts are required to pass a budget by June 30 of each year. Our Board of Education did that on Monday evening. When we know the actual school aid budget for next year if we need to make changes to our budget we will.

Something that you could do to help our district would be to contact our state legislators and encourage them to pass a school aid budget. Our state legislators are:

Representative Bryan Posthumus – BryanPosthumus@house.mi.gov

Senator Mark Huizenga – senmhuizenga@senate.michigan.gov

A simple message would be as follows:

School districts need to know their funding for the 2025-2026 school year. As you are aware schools must pass a budget for the 2025-2026 school year by June 30.

Last year our school district did not receive an increase to our per pupil allocation. This significantly impacted our revenue.

This year, in order to keep up with inflation and to support our staff, I would encourage you to pass a school aid budget that supports the work our district does each day.

A simple email from our Rockford families would help move the budget process along at the state level.

Our school district had a wonderful 2024-2025 school year. Here are some highlights:

1. Our updated strategic plan – RAMS XII - was created and approved.
   1. We have made positive forward movement on implementing goals connected to RAMS XII
2. Edgerton Trails officially opened.
3. New language arts curriculum – Core Knowledge Language Arts (CKLA) – was implemented in DK-5
4. New social studies curriculum was implemented at middle school
5. The new 6^th grade wing at North Rockford Middle School was finished.
6. Our achievement continues to improve and demonstrate that our commitment to the PLC process is effective.
   1.  The top 50 Michigan school districts for each school subject, via test scores - mlive.com
7. We had great arts programs
   1. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
   2. Seussical the Musical
   3. Into the Woods Jr.
   4. Our marching band finished 2^nd in Division One at the marching band state competition
   5. Orchestra took a trip to NYC
   6. Choir toured Croatia and Italy
   7. Next week our Spanish Immersion middle schoolers go to Costa Rica
8. Athletics had a successful year.
   1. This spring:
      1. Girls’ water polo won a state championship
         1. This makes two years in a row that the girls won the state championship
      2. Boys’ and girls’ lacrosse advanced to the state semifinals
      3. A girls’ tennis doubles team won a state championship
      4. Our girls’ track team finished second at the Michigan Track Coaches Association championship
      5. At the state individual track meet we had several outstanding performances:
         1. 4x400m Relay (8th)- Audrey Zollman, Lola Davey, Sadie Plain, Sarah MacIntosh
         2. 4x100m Relay (7th)- Macy VandenHout, Greta Caprathe, Maiya Corrigan, Lillian Green
         3. 400m Dash (7th)- Sarah MacIntosh
         4. Pole Vault (7th)- Maiya Corrigan
         5. Shot Put (8th)- Liv Hosford
         6. Long Jump (5th)- Greta Caprathe
         7. Discus (6th)- Liv Hosford
         8. High Jump (1st)- Greta Caprathe
         9. High Jump (3rd)- Layla Visser
            
            

The 2025-2026 calendar is on the district website. Our first day of school will be August 25.

I hope you have a great summer. I will send periodic updates this summer as needed.

Steve

Dr. Steve Matthews
Superintendent
Rockford Public Schools

Good afternoon,

The month of May is a busy time in our district. Field days and field trips fill our school days, and on three evenings in May/June, we have graduation celebrations. This year our graduation celebrations take place:

• May 19 – Rockford High School
• May 29 – River Valley Academy
• June 4 – Adult Education
  
  

Each of these graduation events help us remember the promise and the power of our schools. To unite a community. To prepare our children.

Reading Rocks is this Saturday, May 31, in downtown Rockford. It begins at 9:45 AM and the activities continue through 1:00 PM.

As we look ahead to the end of the school year and the beginning of summer, remember that learning doesn’t end! I would encourage you to develop a plan to keep your children engaged in learning over the summer months. Here are some opportunities to take advantage of: 

• Our Rockford Book Bus will be visiting neighborhoods. You can check our district website for more information.
• Youth enrichment and summer camps are offered through our Community Services office. Check the “Youth Enrichment” link on the Community Services tab on our website.
• The Krause Memorial Library of the Kent District Library (KDL) has a wide variety of activities and lots of books.
  • The KDL Summer Wonder runs June 2 – August 8.
• Our Media Specialists have created a summer reading guide. You can access it here:
  • Summer Reading RPS 2025
    
    

This spring was a busy one for our students! 

• Odyssey of the Mind students participated in the World Finals.
• Our athletic teams at the middle schools and high school have been very successful.
• Our bands, choirs, and orchestras wrapped up the year with spring concerts.
• Our Rockford High School National Honor Society inducted new members.
  
  

Remember, as if you needed reminding, that school ends June 6. June 5 and June 6 are half days.

Steve

Dr. Steve Matthews
Superintendent
Rockford Public Schools

Good afternoon,

Tom Hosford, our Rockford High School principal, was approved last night by the Forest Hills Public Schools Board of Education to serve as their Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources.

Mr. Hosford is a valuable member of our administrative team. He has been the principal at Rockford High School for the past four years and has served in our district as an administrator and a teacher for 22 years. He is also a graduate of Rockford High School, proud class of 1998.

Mr. Hosford has spent his career preparing for leadership. He has served at multiple administrative levels in our district, and our district has done a good job of preparing Mr. Hosford, as we do all our administrators, for increased responsibility. That preparation brings opportunity.

The opportunity will lead Mr. Hosford away from Rockford. He is ready for this opportunity. I wish him well as he transitions out of Rockford over the next several weeks. His official start date in Forest Hills will be July 1.

In our district, we have posted the job of Rockford High School principal. We have a process in place to move forward to identify and hire the next great principal. Our hope is to have the process complete by the end of June.

On a personal note, I wish Mr. Hosford well. He is a passionate, kind, caring colleague. More importantly, he is a good friend. I will miss him.

Steve

Dr. Steve Matthews
Superintendent
Rockford Public Schools

Good afternoon,

Our Rockford Public Schools’ Board of Education met on Monday, May 12. Key agenda items included the following:

• Approved an 11th grade English curriculum
• Approved updated policies
• Highlighted our DK-5th grade STEAM program

You can access the board meeting agenda on our district website or through this link: Board of Education - Our District - Rockford Public Schools

I also wanted to alert parents, especially of secondary students, about a TikTok challenge that seems to be making the rounds. Students across multiple school districts, including in Kent County, are deliberately causing electrical short circuits in Chromebook devices by inserting metal objects (paper clips, pushpins, pencil lead) into USB ports. The trend is called the #chromebookchallenge. This dangerous trend:

• Causes fires, smoke, and potential battery explosions
• Has led to school evacuations in multiple districts
• Creates serious safety hazards, including toxic fumes
• Results in costly device damage (which families may be responsible for)
• Can lead to suspension, expulsion, and criminal charges, including vandalism or arson
• Diverts unnecessary first responder resources to the school

If you could talk with your students and make them aware that this is not acceptable behavior, we would appreciate it. It could obviously lead to dangerous situations, but could also result in discipline. It would also lead to your family being responsible for replacing a Chromebook.

We have several graduation events coming in the next few weeks:

• Rockford High School – May 19
• River Valley Academy – May 29
• Rockford Adult Education – June 4

We congratulate the graduates and celebrate with them this good news!

Steve

Dr. Steve Matthews
Superintendent
Rockford Public Schools

Good afternoon,

Today at Rockford High School, in cooperation with our security and local safety partners, we brought in their trained dogs to do a protective sweep of our high school parking lot. This is a routine and preventive practice that helps keep our students and staff safe while at school.

Unfortunately, a member of our Rockford High School NITRO team, which is our high school skeet shooting team, had a long gun in the trunk of the car. The dogs reacted to the car and, upon investigation and with consent of the student, a search discovered a long gun in the trunk.

Administrators and our school resource officer investigated, including interviews with the student and the parents. The parents of the student were called, and the gun was removed from our campus. We are also taking the appropriate disciplinary action.

At no time was school safety compromised. It is clear from the investigation that there was no ill intent. It was an unfortunate mistake.

We offer a wide variety of activities for our students to be involved in at Rockford High School – including skeet shooting. Each sport has rules that students must follow as part of the team. The skeet shooting team knows they must keep long guns used in competition off of school property.

This unfortunate circumstance was handled without incident at the high school. I wanted to make sure you heard about this incident from me. Thus, this email.

Steve

Dr. Steve Matthews
Superintendent
Rockford Public Schools