Visitors to the Bellwood-Antis School District will soon no longer have to say “Who was that?” while walking the halls in the buildings.
Earlier this week, the district’s board of directors approved unanimously, 9-0, to order name tags for all employees, as well as school board members.
“I think this is a positive approach to ensuring the safety of the employees of the district, as well as the students who attend classes here,” said G. Brian Toth, the district’s superintendent. “A good number of other districts do this, and we felt we should do the same thing.”
According to Toth, Provine Studios of Altoona will take the photos and give the district free badges. He said district personnel should be wearing the name tags no later than late November.
Ken Swanson, the district’s business manager, was also on hand at the meeting to give a PowerPoint presentation concerning the district’s new cafeteria “point-of-sale” payment system.
“This is a really great system that’s working well,” said Toth. “There were a few bugs in the beginning, but our technology director (Mike Lingenfelter) has done a really nice job getting things up and running the way they should be. It’s making things a lot easier not only on the cafeteria staff, but also for students and parents.”
The system allows parents to place money, either through check, credit card or cash at the school, into their child’s account to pay for school lunches. When the student comes through the lunch line, they just tell the cashier their personal identification number.
“When the cashier punches in that number, a picture of the student appears on the screen so they know they are dealing with the right student,” said Toth, noting that the account balance is also shown on the screen.
Toth said one of the main advantages of the system is that it keeps students who are involved in the free or reduced lunch programs completely anonymous.
Toth said that he anticipates times when students will come through the line and show a “zero” account balance. He said this will not, in most circumstances, keep a student from receiving a lunch.
“We will accommodate students who do not have money in their accounts, but will do so only if it’s not a habitual thing,” said Toth.
Parents can deposit money into their student’s account either with a credit card or debit. The website address is www.comalex.com.
