At the Whitehall-Coplay School Board meeting Feb. 11, PTO Plus president Toni Fillman discussed the Scholastic book fair bingo, held Feb. 8 at Whitehall-Coplay Middle School. Fillman credited book fair coordinator and volunteer Tracey Corteen, members of Whitehall High School’s Student Council and National Honor Society and PTO Plus volunteers with the success of the event, which was a fundraiser for Zephyr Elementary School.

“Each year, we do a bingo for each of the four schools, and it was so successful,” Fillman said. “We were booked to the max, and we had to turn people away. There wasn’t any seating. It was just such a fun night, and the prizes were Scholastic dollars they got to spend right away on books.”

Fillman also announced Steckel Elementary School was chosen by Scholastic for a visit from Sandra Markle, author of “What If You Had T. Rex Teeth?: And Other Dinosaur Parts.”

Steckel Elementary students will have a chance to pre-order books to have signed during Markle’s visit Feb. 28.

In other business, the board approved the purchase of three new textbooks for WCMS at a total cost of $138,277. “World Cultures and Geography Survey,” “World History: Great Civilizations” and “U.S. History American Stories: Beginnings to 1877” are all published by National Geographic.

The board approved a field trip request for the Whitehall High School baseball and softball teams’ spring trip to Myrtle Beach, scheduled for March 20-24, at no cost to the district.

Also approved was a request for the Whitehall High School baseball team’s trip to Cooperstown, N.Y., April 27-28, at no cost to the district.

The board approved band director Matthew Tanzos’ request for the Whitehall Marching Zephyr Band to attend a spring trip to Philadelphia, planned for April 27, at no cost to the district.

The board approved the contract between Whitehall-Coplay School District and Vanguard Modular Building Systems LLC for the lease of six modular classrooms at Gockley Elementary School. These classrooms will be used in the upcoming 2019-20 school year, when kindergartners will begin a new full-day program.

The board accepted the resignations of Gail Smith, bus driver; Renee Sturtevant, paraprofessional at WCMS; Stacey Gilly, secretary to the athletic director; and Roula Khoury, Zephyr Elementary cafeteria worker.

New appointments include temporary professional Coral Suppan, WHS chemistry teacher, at the rate of $51,486; salaried substitute Hailey Arnold, WHS biology teacher, at the rate of $48,165; salaried substitute Leah Jaremenko, WCMS health/physical education teacher, at the rate of $51,486; long-term substitute Gayle Ganser, second-grade teacher at Steckel, at the rate of $150 per day; Debra Resh, districtwide health room assistant, at the rate of $19.82 per hour; bus drivers Kenneth Kline and Christopher Schlosser; and WHS special education department leader Jennifer Stancombe, at the additional compensation of $1,729.

In other news, Superintendent Dr. Lorie Hackett announced that due to exceeded snow days, April 18 will now be a make-up day. Students will still have off Feb. 15 and 18.

The school board will hold committee meetings on finance/personnel, education/student activities and operations/transportation 4 p.m. Feb. 25 and March 25. The board will hold an operations/transportation committee meeting 4 p.m. March 18.

The next regular school board meeting will be 7 p.m. March 11. A special school board meeting will be held 5 p.m. March 25.