During the public participation portion of the meeting of the Gilpin County Board of Education on April 18, 2023, the Board heard a donor’s concern over the closure and perceived mismanagement of the EaglesMart.

Carrie Ihme spoke to the board about her “disappointment in the lack of school district and the Gilpin County Education Foundation and the EaglesMart program.” The EaglesMart program was conceived of as a vocational program that would give students work experience while also allowing the school to raise funds from the sale of products. As previously reported by The Mountain-Ear, the project, however, struggled from its launch and was permanently shut down in February of this year. At the time of its closure, the EaglesMart owed the district close to $160,000.

Ihme told the board that she and her husband stopped attending donor fundraisers to the school in 2019 due to their concern of perceived mismanagement of their funds when it came to EaglesMart. She called the program “a failure,” pointing out that few students had ever taken advantage of the work-study program. She specifically expressed her concern over the “perceived conflict of interest” of Board Vice President Sarah Swanson who is also President of the Gilpin County Education Foundation and who ran the program. She demanded that there be more transparency in the future. “This was a gross oversight and shouldn’t have happened. That’s a hundred and sixty thousand dollars that the kids don’t have to use,” she told the Board. Ihme also spoke of her concerns about the program in August of 2019.

At the end of her allotted time, Ihme emphasized that she wasn’t there to “hang anyone out to dry,” called the Board members her “friends,” and said she wanted to be part of a future solution that would prevent this from happening again. Board President Marr responded, saying that they could put policies in place but there was no guarantee that future Boards wouldn’t undo them.

Swanson, who was absent from the meeting, didn’t respond to The Mountain-Ear’s request to comment in time for this article.

The school board also heard and approved the 2023-2024 budget in the amount of $16,566,035 on first reading. They also approved a supplemental budget for June in the amounts of $5,224,377, a Food Service Budget of $19,145, and several other budget lines that can be found in the minutes on the School Board’s Agenda folder for May 2 found on their website.

Elementary School principal Heather Huntoon and Secondary Principal Alexis Donaldson also presented reports on their schools and programs. Huntoon announced that 49% of students identified at the beginning of the year with Severe Learning Deficits (SDL) at the beginning of the year have improved beyond having SDL. Donaldson commented on the success of prom and recognized two students, Skyley Ramsey and Abigail Smith, who received an Academic Honorable Mention for Class 2A in Basketball.

Patrick Linnehan presented the work done by his 5th Grade class in their technology class with two of his students, who brought their final products to the meeting. Given the option to re-create a historical artifact or create a future product, the students chose to 3D print mythical creatures that may one day be remote-controlled. The students showed the Board the various growth stages of their phoenix and wyvern, respectively, and shared their experience in making the creatures in class. The Board also saw presentations by two other elementary students.

The Gilpin County School Board meets bi-monthly on the first and third Tuesdays of the month. Board meetings are held in the Gilpin County School Boardroom at 7 p.m. and are open to the public.