The Geary USD 475 Board of Education was presented with two options Monday for live streaming their meetings online from the Devin Center. They will consider the options at their February 5th meeting.

One option involves use of the Ross system, explained BOE President Ferrell Miller. “That’s a system that could allow us to do closed captioning, to slice video on the fly and send that information to You Tube so it could be seen live.” The estimated cost would be approximately $68,000 with annual updates totaling about $14,500.

The second option involves the TriCaster system, including the use of staff would cost approximately $56,600. Miller stated, “We could even skype that. Students could be trained to use it. It could be a good entry level experience for them as part of their career options. TriCaster equipment has already been utilized in the past at Junction City High School.

There will also be immediate work to put a sound system in place to amplify the Board members voices during their meetings so they can be better heard.

The topic has arisen in response to public input and interest in having the meetings televised or live streamed. Public input on the proposal to stream the meetings live is welcome.

The Board has also decided to move their meeting start times to 5:30 p.m. at the Devin Center beginning in February. The first half hour would be allotted for teaching and learning presentations, with the business portion of the agenda including the public comment session starting at 6 p.m. That is being done to allow members of the public to get off work or eat an evening meal before attending the Board meeting.