ST. ANNE — The numbers used to identify school districts might appear random, but they are in fact assigned by the regional office of education.

So when St. Anne’s two districts were preparing to consolidate, they were given the opportunity to have a say in what their new name would be.

The former districts — St. Anne Grade School District 256 and St. Anne Community High School District 302 — are now one entity known as St. Anne Unit District 24.

The change took effect July 1. About 500 students are enrolled in the new district.

I-KAN Regional Superintendent Frank Petkunas had asked for input on what members of the two schools would like as their new district number.

St. Anne Superintendent Charles Stegall, who already had been the superintendent for both school districts before the consolidation, said the number 24 seemed perfect, as it reflects the year the community passed a referendum allowing the consolidation to happen.

The simple majority vote needed for the measure to pass was exceeded during the March election, with 71% of St. Anne voters approving and 60% approving when combining St. Anne and Pembroke area voters.

Pembroke School District 259, which feeds into SACHS, declined to be part of the consolidation, so their status hasn’t changed.

“We can always remember that it started in 2024,” Stegall said.

But coming up with a new title was just one piece of the puzzle of fitting the two districts together.

Stegall said this summer has been more hectic than usual as St. Anne prepares to start the 2024-25 school year.

“It seems like there is something new that pops up every day,” he said. “Really, it’s just been a lot of hours put in by a lot of people, but a lot of positive things are coming out of it.”

Getting various systems set up has taken a good portion of that time.

Some larger tasks have included transitioning from two student management systems, two district websites, and two accounts for TRS and IMRF retirement programs into one.

The new district website is <a href="http://www.stanne24.org" target="_blank">stanne24.org</a>.

Things have gone “relatively smooth[ly],” but they’ve taken a lot of time and effort.

Things that had been in place for years needed to be redone, such as state and federal identifications.

“It’s definitely been an eye-opening experience,” he said.

That doesn’t mean they were not prepared.

As soon as the referendum passed, Stegall had a meeting with his office staff and developed several pages of items they knew would need to be taken care of in the coming months.

He noted his office staff, Lisa Stalnecker and Jill Cowsert, have been instrumental in keeping on task.

“They have really taken this on as a passion project of theirs, and without them, we would be way behind,” Stegall said.

Everyone had a lot of work in front of them, but they knew it was going to pay off in the end with more efficiencies on the horizon, he said.

For instance, St. Anne previously had two separate school boards and two board meetings per month; now, only one meeting per month is needed.

The new school board had its first meeting July 18.

The board includes Aaron Hays, Tim Wendt, Jessica Jackson, Gilberto Miramontes, Lucas O’Connell and John Louie Farber. The board is looking to fill the vacancy for its seventh seat by September.

The district is slated to receive funding from the state of Illinois to assist with consolidation beginning this fall.

The funds will be distributed during the next four years.

A final amount has not yet been determined, but it previously was estimated the district would receive an incentive of more than $1 million from the state to assist with reorganization, plus additional state payments to offset costs totaling $624,000.

Stegall said the primary focus of the incentive dollars is to offset differences in teacher salary schedules when districts consolidate.

“When you negotiate, people aren’t going to take less money,” he said. “The purpose of the incentive dollars is to help bridge that gap for the period of four years in order to allow that district to kind of get off the ground and then make changes to be able to become self-sustainable after four years.”

One thing that isn’t changing, at least for now, is the schools’ mascots.

St. Anne Grade School will remain the Giants, and St. Anne Community High School will remain the Cardinals.

That could change in the future if the school board or the community wants one unified mascot, but it wasn’t a focal point of the consolidation.

Overall, there won’t be any major changes when students return to school Aug. 16.

Discussions on long-range planning likely will take place once the district is fully up and running in the fall.

“We’re still in the infancy stages of becoming a district,” Stegall said. “It sounds kind of strange because all the people are the same people we’ve had in place for years, but the fact of the matter is because we’re brand new, we have to make sure everything is in place and is operating the way it’s supposed to be.”