Benjamin Franklin is said to have coined the phrase, “Time is money.”

As the Solon Community School District’s Board of Education found out, time, or ensuring the correct time across the vast expanse of the high school building, can indeed be money as a $24,369.68 bid was received to replace malfunctioning and non-functioning clocks. The board discussed the defective timepieces, and multiple time zones during their regular meeting Thursday, August 21 as an information item (discussion only, no action to be taken at this time).

“(The) high school clocks don’t work,” said Board President Dr. Tim Brown, opening the discussion.

Superintendent Davis Eidahl reported Maintenance Technician Kevin Zimmerman was directed to look into the problem. Zimmerman contacted Primex Wireless, Inc,. in Lake Geneva, WI, who has supplied the clocks in other buildings in the district.

“Primex went through our building and did a quote, $24,000, to equip the high school with the same system,” Eidahl said.

“That’s a lot more expensive than I expected,” said Brown.

Brown noted student feedback reported students were being counted as tardy when there aren’t reliably functioning clocks to show them the correct time.

“That is our challenge,” he said, “We’re telling you that you can’t use your phone to tell what time it is, people do not wear watches that are not connected to their phones.”

“We’ve asked Bryan (Heinsius, Buildings & Grounds Director) to reach out to his network to see what other companies districts use or whatever type of clocks they use,” said Eidahl.

Brown asked for an action item to be on the September agenda.

“We want to make some decision other than just be informed,” he said. “It sounds like we need clocks, right? We want you (Eidahl) to explore what the options are and put something on the board for action and we can decide what that decision will be in September. If we don’t have something better, this might be our best option. See if you can get creative. Maybe we don’t need clocks in every classroom, maybe we just have to have them in the hallways.”

Jaya Farlinger, a non-voting Student Board Representative expressed support for clocks.

Further compounding the issue, while the high school runs on a “bell schedule,” there is no bell, buzzer, or beep sounded at the start or end of the school day periods.

“I will just tell you that I’ve been on the board for a long time and when I joined the board, these clocks didn’t work correctly, and they still don’t work. And I’m done telling you that.”