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Mountain Home Public Schools will roughly double the number of security cameras in parts of its high school and install audio recording devices to comply with a new state law, paying for both projects with leftover state school-safety money, Technology Supervisor Steve Mendleski told the school board May 21.
The district will replace 24 cameras at the high school and expand to 54, focused on three areas: the 300 hall, the 700 hall and the new gymnasium, including the adjoining football field and concession area. Mendleski said the upgrade will be covered by state security funding left over from earlier projects and will not cost the district out of pocket.
The second project addresses Eli’s Law, a state law passed in 2025 that requires Arkansas public schools to install audio recording devices in locker rooms and changing areas by the 2027-28 school year. The law, sponsored by Rep. Keith Brooks, was prompted by reports of abuse in school locker rooms. It requires schools to post signs notifying people that recordings are being made, retain recordings for a set period and limit access to administrators investigating allegations.
Mendleski told the board he had held off on the requirement while searching for an affordable approach. The products marketed for the law would have cost the district $30,000 to $50,000 and required a licensing renewal after five years, he said. Instead, his department found a solution that uses an existing recorder to capture an audio feed, similar to how a camera works, for about $15,800.
“I found a device that is perfect,” Mendleski said. “Super easy to maintain and do.”
The setup will cover about 25 areas, including locker rooms at the high school, Pinkston Middle School and the junior high and changing areas at Dunbar, with signage posted as the law requires. Mendleski said the leftover state security money will pay for that project as well, and that the district will have spare microphones available if more areas need coverage. The state law allows districts to use school-safety funds to meet the requirement.
The board also heard an update on the district’s network. Mendleski said the district’s E-Rate work for the 2026-27 school year is complete, a process handled a year in advance. The federal program offsets much of the cost of school internet and networking equipment.
The coming year’s main project is replacing core network switches installed seven to 10 years ago. Mendleski said the project will cost $166,000, but the district’s share after E-Rate reimbursement will be about $33,000. He said the district has roughly $750,000 to spend over a five-year cycle, with network switches the focus this year and Wi-Fi upgrades planned for later years.
Mendleski also highlighted the district’s Chromebook repair operation. A single technician, identified as Martin, logged more than 1,600 repairs this school year and tracks each one, giving the department data on repair trends by building.
The district harvests usable parts from Chromebooks that are broken beyond repair or have reached the end of their licensing life. Mendleski said the technician salvages screens, which are interchangeable across the district’s Chromebooks, and has found a way to remove and reuse keyboards that normally cannot be extracted without destroying them. The practice saves the district between $5,000 and $10,000 a year on parts.
“Chromebooks aren’t worth anything after eight years, so we’re better just to pull the parts out,” Mendleski said.
The department also told the board it is changing how it monitors student screen time. District Testing Coordinator Becca Camp said the district will now pull analytics from Clever, the single sign-on platform that students use to reach the roughly 19 programs they log into. A recent 21-day sample showed students spending an average of about 62 minutes a day online.
