District staff began a community conversation with the Hutchinson School Board Monday night about the naming of different facilities.

The discussion is the localization to a national trend. With reduced financial resources from the state and federal sources, school districts across the nation are looking for different ways to fund education.

One of those means is allowing donors to place their names on different school facilities for a pre-determined amount of time.

Superintendent Shelly Kiblinger and Executive Director of Human Resources Rick Kraus briefed the Board on initial work that has been done in the district, looking at possible scenarios and legal aspects of naming rights.

The board also approved the purchase of 100-hundred thousand dollars worth of library books from 2006 bond issue fund. The books will go to all K-12 buildings.

They also approved memorandums of understanding with Smart Start for a pilot project for the 4-year-old program at Lincoln and Graber elementary schools.

They approved spending 29-thousand, 760-dollars for broadcast journalism equipment from Wink Audio Visual.

The annual YMCA contract for use of its facilities for physical education classes and the Hutchinson High School’s interscholastic swimming teams was also approved at a cost of 13-thousand, 200-dollars for the year, up 12-hundred from last year. The increase was the first in three years. YMCA facilities are adjacent to Hutch High.

The next regular board meeting will be at 7 p-m on September 26, at the Administration Center.