DICKINSON — The Dickinson Public Schools (DPS) school board convened Monday, July 20, at the DPS Professional Learning Lab for its annual meeting held at the start of a new school year. The meeting involved electing a president and vice president, reviewing the progress of the Dickinson High School reconstruction and discussing academic goals for its students.
The school board consists of Michelle Orton, Kim Schwartz, Jason Rodakowski, Brent Seaks and Dave Wilkie. At the start of the meeting, the school board members elected Orton as president and Schwartz as vice president.
ADVERTISEMENT
Following the approval of the meeting agenda, DPS Superintendent Dr. Marcus Lewton presented his report. He began with the Kindergarten pre-registration numbers, which totaled 310 students. That marked an increase of pre-registered students from the previous year’s 286 students.
Lewton also announced the dates for the Back-to-Breakfast and accompanying Superintendent’s Welcome. For students Pre-K through fifth grade, DPS will serve breakfast at Dickinson Middle School on August 17 from 7-8 a.m. For students grades six through 12, DPS will serve breakfast at the same location and time on August 18.
After Lewton gave his report, CEO of RSP & Associates Robert Schwarz addressed the school board. Schwarz briefly talked about how his consulting firm will work with DPS this upcoming semester to evaluate the efficiency of school buildings, the boundaries of attendance and other planning needs. Schwarz explained that the evaluation process will lead to the development of solutions in December, which will be presented to the community.
“Transparency,” he said. “I don’t want us to lose sight of that.”
Lewton further explained to the school board that boundary analysis from RSP & Associates is necessary as the local community either grows or shrinks. He said keeping schools balanced is important in preventing one school being overwhelmed with large class sizes while another school has too few students.
“This is part of the natural growth process,” Lewton said. “Just something that we naturally do periodically.”
Gavin Argent, a project engineer for JE Dunn Construction, was next to speak to the school board. He gave a detailed description of how the construction at Dickinson High School is going, explaining how different parts of the school have progressed. This included the summer project JE Dunn is working on to renovate already existing parts of the school.
ADVERTISEMENT
In May of this year, Argent told The Dickinson Press after a simulated emergency held at the construction site that the new building should be completed by the end of the year. During the school board meeting, he said that the renovations should be complete before the students arrive.
“It’s going well,” Argent said. “We’re looking forward to getting that renovation complete for school starting in August.”
DPS Assistant Superintendent Melanie Kathrein followed Argent with an update on “Choice Ready,” the school board’s third goal to increase academic achievement. Graduating students qualify as Choice Ready if they complete the requirements for “Essential Skills” and two or more of the Choice Ready components.
Achieving Essential Skills involves earning a North Dakota high school diploma, completing a 9-week career education course, passing the North Dakota Civics Exam, completing a computer science/cybersecurity requirement and more. The three Choice Ready components consist of “Post-Secondary Ready,” “Workforce Ready” and “Military Ready,” involving requirements such as achieving a minimum score on the SAT or acquiring workplace learning experience.
The school board’s goal was to have 78.4% of graduating students be Choice Ready by the spring of 2027. Kathrein reported that DPS achieved that goal during the 2025-2026 school year with about 78% of students graduating qualifying. That was an improvement on the 2024-2025 school year’s report of 64%.
“We’re really proud of the work that’s being done around this for students,” Kathrein said. “Kudos to our high school staff for the work that they’re doing in this area.”