MT. JUDEA — The Deer/Mt. Judea School District Board of Education met in regular session Monday night, May 12, and extended the contract of Superintendent Bill Mizaur for the 2025-2026 school year. It was the last item of business on an agenda that included a presentation about roof mounted solar panels designed to help the school district fend off rising costs of electricity.
The superintendent's contract was apparently discussed in executive session. The board made the motion to approve the contract extension when it returned to open session at the end of the night, but not before accepting the resignations from Deer School Principal Joe McKinney and Mt. Judea High School Basketball Coach Chris Wilson.
Mizaur opened the 6:30 p.m. meeting by giving a brief student achievement report. The schools spent much of the past two weeks taking the Arkansas Teaching, Learning & Assessment System (ATLAS) test designed to provide information about the students' mastery of the college and career readiness, academic and language proficiency standards.
The superintendent said 100% of on-campus students and all but three distance-learning program students took the exam. The test is open ended allowing a student all the time needed to complete it. "That is a good thing. We're getting maximum effort."
State officials visited the schools during the testing process, Mizaur said. They found the schools in compliance with the testing process.
He also reported on the Deer School's monthly awards given to a teacher/staff member and students. The entire cafeteria staff received the award for April in tribute to the work it had done all year. It was noted that during a power outage experienced last week, the staff was still able to serve that day's breakfast. Math teacher Timothy Stewart was cited and students honored were Elijah Olivan, high school, and Grayden Hampton, elementary.
Mt. Judea Principal Lindsey Graham was present at the meeting and announced her school's monthly award winners. They are Raylen Parks, elementary; Mary Smith, high school and staff member, Vanessa Smith, school district art teacher.
