Support staff at Kingfisher Public Schools got an immediate raise as the district struggles to find and maintain employees for several positions.

Board of education members spent nearly half of their two-hour regular meeting on Monday discussing the issue before submitting a number of changes to the pay scales.

The district has in place a pay scale for support staff that administers 1 percent raises for every year of employment.

Approved Monday was a minimum $1 per hour raise for most of those positions.

Staff who have been employed for multiple years will see a slightly larger hourly wage increase.

Excluded from that raise were bus drivers, who will see their hourly wage increase even more.

Beginning pay for all bus drivers is now $20 per hour as opposed to the $15.36 beginning wage that was previously in place.

That includes route drivers, substitute route drivers and activity bus drivers.

Non-certified teachers will now earn $75 per day while certified substitute teachers will garner $85 per day, a $15 per day increase for both.

Also seeing a jump will be gate workers for school events. They’ll receive $15 per hour, up $5 per hour. Scorekeepers and clock keepers will earn $20 per game, a bump of $10 per game.

The pay raises went into effect Tuesday.

Summer help pay will remain the same, but the board and Craig agreed to revisit that scale in the spring.

The moves were requested and approved as the district currently faces the struggles of many employers.

“It’s been really tough to hire folks,” Superintendent Dr. Daniel Craig said. “Like everyone else, you can’t get anyone (hired). Then we can’t seem to keep anyone.”

Craig noted he has re ceived one application for a support staff position that’s open for a month.

Kingfisher Middle School Principal Keith Campbell, who is also the transportation director, said - even prior to being dealt issues by COVID-19 - hiring bus drivers for the district’s six current routes has been more than a chore.

Campbell often drives a route himself.

Mandy Owens, one of the district’s band directors, attended the meeting as several of her band students were being recognized earlier in the evening.

Owens currently is one of the route drivers, though she previously made $25 per hour working at the STARS after-school pro-gram, which is funded through a grant.

Despite making considerably less, Owens said she’s continued to drive the bus because “Mr. Campbell really needed the help and I wanted to help.”

(Ed. note: The district keeps a running classified ad in The Times & Free Press seeking bus drivers.)

Currently the district has open five support staff positions, though they’re all new positions to be filled at the new junior high building once it opens.

However, board members did vote Monday to hire Gina Turner as a paraprofessional at Gilmour Elementary School.

It’s the third time that position has had to be filled this school year alone.

Certified staff and support staff will also receive a “retention/new hire” stipend next month.

School personnel last year received a pair of stipends totaling $3,250, some of which was dispersed in November 2020 and then more in the spring of 2021.

Board members opted to provide half that amount - $1,625 - in a stipend next month and then revisit another stipend next spring.

Board meeting dates for 2022 were approved by board members.

As has been for a number of years, most meeting dates will be the first Monday of each month, provided it’s not a holiday.

Craig said they explored moving the meeting date to the second Monday, but payroll complications nixed the idea.

Among the changes in the meetings, however, is moving them back to the Board of Education/ Administration Building beginning in January 2022.

The meetings have been at the KHS cafeteria since the onset of COVID-19.

Also approved at Monday’s meeting were:

• Creation of junior high faculty and junior high student sub-accounts, which will be necessary when the new seventh and eighth grade center is opened;

• An annual contract with QualityCare Labs LLC for drug and alcohol testing;

• Board policy regarding the prohibition of race and sex discrimination in curriculum, which was necessitated by House Bill 1775;

• Out-of-state trips for principals and counselors to attend education workshops in February 2022;

• The resignation of Makayla Epps, a paraprofessional at Gilmour Elementary.