Corsicana Daily Sun - 8/23/2008

It’s back to school time across the county, with most public and private schools along with Navarro College, resuming classes for the fall semester Monday.

With the return to school, the Corsicana Independent School District is introducing two new “hi-tech” aids designed to improve student safety at the high school, and assisting parents in managing their children’s school lunch accounts by way of the Internet.

Corsicana High School has adopted the use of an electronic screening system for visitors. The new visitor tracking system incorporates a search of sex offender data bases in approximately 42 states. The “V-Soft” software is an Internet-based program and allows schools to take the driver’s license of individuals, scan it through a reader, and automatically log the visitor’s name, address, and driver’s license number into a data base. The program also sends out a search of all registered sex offenders databases in 42 states and will return with any possible responses along with a picture of the registered sex offender if it is available.

School personnel will obtain the driver’s license or photo identification of a campus visitor and scan it through the reader.

If the visitor is not a registered sex offender no action will be taken by the system and a visitor’s badge will be printed. All the information from the driver’s license will be stored in the program’s data base.

If the individual is a registered sex offender and a positive response is received, a series of questions will be asked of the visitor to double-check their identity. If it is determined the visitor is a sex offender, they will be escorted off campus by administrative and security staff, unless the visitor is a parent. If so, they will be allowed to see their child, but will be escorted throughout their time on campus by administrative or security staff.

All visitors to Corsicana High School will be required to go through the V-Soft screening system before entering the main portion of the campus. The visitor’s driver’s license will be left in the office until the visitor’s pass is returned when exiting the campus.

The CISD has also switched to a new online service for managing student’s lunch money accounts with a program named MyNutriKids.com.

This service also provides parents the ability to view their child’s account balance through the MyNutriKids.com Web site. By having money in each child’s account prior to entering the cafeteria, the campus Child Nutrition Department finds that lunch lines move along much faster so children have more time to eat.

If a parent used MealPay last year, any funds remaining in the accounts will be rolled over into the MyNutriKids.com system.

Also, parents will have the ability to print out a copy of their child’s eating history report. This history report will show all dates and times the child purchased a breakfast and/or lunch within the past 30 days.

To access these services, parents can go the district web site at www.cisd.org, then click on Departments/Child Nutrition. Click on the MyNutrikids.com link. From this site parents will create an account and add money to their child’s school meal account. If a parent has more than one child in the district they can handle all online prepayments from the same online account. Payments may be made through an existing PayPal account or with a major credit or debit card.

In order to use the online prepayment service, a small convenience fee for each transaction will be assessed to cover the bank fees. The convenience fee is $1.75 per deposit transaction. Parents placing money into multiple meal accounts will only be assessed the $1.75 fee once per deposit transaction. Corsicana School District’s Child Nutrition Services will not profit from the use of this site. The new service will be available beginning Aug. 25.

If parents choose not to take advantage of the online prepayment service they may continue to make advance payments via check, which should be made payable to the Corsicana Child Nutrition Services. More information about both new programs is available by contacting the School Administration building at (903) 874-7441, or the Child Nutrition Service office at (903) 641-4140.