Recent actions by school boards in Northeast Michigan:

∫ The Alpena Community College Board of Trustees agreed on Friday to spend $259,457 to purchase 440 Microsoft laptops with funding from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act.

College officials have found the Chromebook laptops used by Early College or dual enrollment students do not allow for Microsoft Office software to be installed on them but the new laptops will. The laptops would be checked out to students based on their need and on a semester by semester basis.

The board also recently approved an $89,809 anatomage table, which will help its nursing students learn about anatomy in a three dimensional format and spent $9,500 on career exploration software. Both purchases were made using grant funding.

Alpena Community College’s fall enrollment is down 4.1% in headcount and 6.8% in credit hours compared to the fall 2019 semester, College President Don MacMaster said in his report to the ACC Board of Trustees. However, the college saw online course enrollment increase 148.9% in credit hours and 102% in headcount.

Early college enrollment and dual enrollment was also up, with students in both categories responsible for 40.76% of the college’s headcount and 28.92% of credit hours. Continuing students and new first time students continued to make up the majority of the headcount and credit hours.

∫ The Alpena Public Schools Board of Education has agreed to host a day treatment program at ACES Academy for youth ages 13 to 17 who are at risk for out-of-home or out-of-community treatment.

The program allows for education, vocational training, psychological counseling, family involvement, and cognitive interventions.

Before youth are placed in the program, they will receive the Michigan Juvenile Justice Assessment System risk assessment system, which will measure their criminogenic risk.

The board also accepted the terms and conditions outlined in the purchase agreement for the APS Bus Transportation Center from Vautgrand Holdings, LLC. Vautgrand Holdings has 60 days to develop the site plans for the project and the board has 30 days to review their plan.

If the parties cannot agree to plans for a new facility, the agreement would be terminated. If the agreement goes through, a new transportation center will be constructed behind Alpena High School’s Wildcat Stadium and the old transportation center would be demolished. The developer has plans for an Aldi grocery store to be built there.