DeKalb High School Principal Larry Stinson announced that the DHS race task force will include students, parents and community members of all races.

Stinson announced details of the race task force at Monday night’s District 428 School Board meeting. The task force was created in response to the E.G. Weekly, a newsletter produce by students and distributed at the high school.

The task force will have 15 people, Stinson said. Larry Bolles, director of the NIU Judicial Office, will chair the task force.

The task force will investigate race and sexual orientation discrimination and, Stinson said, hopefully will make policy recommendations by December.

“We are hoping by ferreting out these issues it may become a district-wide effort,” Stinson said.

In other business, the school board approved tax levy estimates for the 2004 budget.

The levy estimated 2004 revenue for the district at $31,097,508, a 6.35 percent increase from 2003, said MeriAnn Besonen, assistant superintendent of business and finance.

Taxes, however, will increase by no more than 1.9 percent, Besonen said. The increase is limited based on inflation as gauged by the consumer price index.

The school board also unanimously adopted a school-choice policy to comply with the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act. The act allows students in schools that do not make adequate yearly progress two years in a row to transfer to another public school at the district’s expense.

The board discussed District 428’s lack of an alternate option for students at Clinton Rosette Middle School, 650 N. First St.

Clinton Rosette has not made adequate yearly progress for two consecutive years, said Linell Lasswell, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction.

The district has to give all students at Clinton Rosette the option to enroll in an adjacent district’s school or provide supplemental services through a state-approved provider, Lasswell said.