December 6, 2021 Summary

HIGHLIGHTS: Superintendent Search Process (6:44); Comments from the audience (6:56 & 7:23); Covid Update (7:08); High Teacher Turnover (7:13)

6:29 – Every seat was filled and there were people lined up outside the door. I counted about 70 in the audience in total with many parents holding “Transparency” and “Support Dr. Yin” signs. Of those in attendance, I counted 12 union leaders and teachers from the Jr/Sr HS. I didn’t see any teachers from WLES or WLIS in the audience.

6:31 – Karpick called the meeting to order. He called for a vote to approve the agenda and then to approve the minutes from the November meeting. Yin commented that she appreciates that the minutes have now started to include more details and information. She is right; over the last year the school board has slowly increased the amount of detail included in the minutes. 

    Voted 7 out of 7

6:32 – Shelby Johnson, Assistant Principal at the Jr/Sr HS and Director of Special Education, invited the principal from each school (WLES, WLIS, Jr/Sr HS) to recognize students with the “Red Devil Pride Way to Go Award” for being great citizens. Two students from each school came to the front individually while the school administrator shared why this student was chosen and then each student was given a certificate. I love seeing these kids and families being celebrated!

6:40 – Karpick excused those families who attended to see the Way to Go Awards, which opened a few more seats for those standing. He then asked board members to help him get more chairs to make sure everyone had a seat. This was a very welcoming gesture.

6:44 – Springer read a detailed list of the steps for the superintendent search and noted that information about the superintendent search was posted to the school website (posted just a few hours before the meeting.)

• May 3, 2021 – Killion announced his retirement
• May 2021 – School board researched 4 superintendent search firms and interviewed 2
• June 6, 2021 – School board announced hiring Administrator Assistance to help with the search and appointed Sloat as Interim Superintendent
• June 2021 – Superintendent search tab added to school’s web page
• July 12, 2021 – Pettibone hired as interim superintendent at a rate of $1,200/day
• July 23, 2021 – Vacancy and application posted and distributed nationally. It was not a good decision to wait all summer and then right before the start of the school year to open the search because potential applicants are very busy at this time. In addition, the posted start date of January 2022 discourages applicants because it is difficult for school administrators to leave their current job to start a new one in the middle of the school year.
• August 9, 2021 – School board sent out a survey to teachers, staff, and the community with a press release and posts on social media. 438 people responded, providing input on the types of qualities they want in the new superintendent. The high response shows that the community cares a great deal about the superintendent search.
• August 23, 2021 – School board held two public forums to again ask teachers, staff, and community members for the types of qualities they want in the new superintendent. Very few people came to speak. I responded to the survey and it wasn’t clear to me what additional community involvement they were seeking at this stage that wasn’t already in the survey responses. The school board provided some superficial information and did not respond to community requests to form a search advisory committee and provide a way for teachers to meet with the final candidates before the hiring decision is made.
• Late August 2021 – School board posted an article to the website touting the advantages of confidentiality in a superintendent search. This appears to have been the school board’s response to the community requests for a search advisory committee and a way for teachers to give feedback on the final set of candidates. I don’t think anyone expected the school board to disclose the names of all the applicants. However, many community members think that the school board should have invited the final 2 or 3 candidates to come visit the school district, meet with teachers, and answer their questions, as this is done in many other school districts. Being named a finalist for the West Lafayette Superintendent job is impressive and would likely result in career benefits even if the finalist was not offered the WL job.
• August 26, 2021 – School board shared survey response summary results about what had been collected from the 438 survey responses. It’s a great list of qualities and really reflects our community. Note that top of the list is: “listening to all stakeholders – teachers, staff, administration, students, parents, community members.”
• August 27, 2021 – Application window closed. Springer announced that they received 17 applications. Again, I’m disappointed that the school board thought that the first month of school would be a good time to seek applications.
• September 13-22, 2021 – First round interviews of 7 candidates
• October 20 – November 4, 2021 – Second round interviews of 4 candidates
• November 15, 2021 – Third round of interviews of the 2 finalists
• November 18, 2021 – School board meets and does not vote, but reaches a “consensus” on which candidate to hire. This is obviously a point of contention on the board. From Yin’s comments at the end of the meeting it is clear that she did not think that a decision had been made.
• December 3, 2021 – The new superintendent contract is posted
• December 13, 2021 – A public hearing on the contract will be held at 5:00 pm in the Happy Hollow LGI room.
• December 20, 2021 – A special meeting of the school board will be held at 5:30 in the Happy Hollow LGI room to vote to approve the contract and hiring the new superintendent.

Springer sounded defensive as she read the statement. The theme throughout the remarks appeared to be that she views confidentiality as an essential characteristic of the search. It’s not clear why Springer is now defending an entirely secret process with no input on the candidates. She was on the school board for the past two superintendent searches that used a search advisory committee that included teachers and community members so they could give input on the candidates. I don’t know why she no longer views seeking input as desirable. My view is that applicants should be promised confidentiality until they are named as a finalist. Finalists should come for a public visit. That seems like a good balance between getting a large applicant pool and allowing for community and teacher input. Springer has given brief updates at each of the last few school board meetings, but it was not clear until now that the school board had no intention of ever seeking any teacher or community input. Although she did provide some new information, there are remaining questions she didn’t answer. For example,

• Which search companies were considered and why did they select Administrator Assistance?
• How many of the applicants are from outside of Indiana? How many are from Tippecanoe and surrounding counties? How many are from TSC, LSC, and WLCSC?
• How many applicants are female? How many are Black, Hispanic, Asian?

One last point – it looked like the school corporation attorney, Reiling, handed Springer the script that she read. Maybe one reason he bills the school corporation more than $300,000/year is that they are paying him to do more than just provide legal advice? 

6:54 – Karpick asked Tom Austin, a leader of Administrator Assistance, to share his thoughts on the search process. Austin complimented the board on their confidential process and that in his experience from having been involved in about 15 searches, he thought that we had the strongest group of applicants he had ever seen. His claim that this was the best search he has been involved with suggests that this is not a very experienced consulting group. Their website lists testimonials from Clinton Central, Benton Community, North Judson-San Pierre, Logansport Community, and South Central Community School Corporations. Tom Austin’s comments were a complete contradiction of those that Steve Wittenauer, another Administrator Assistants leader, made at the June 2021 meeting (at time 8:06). Wittenauer said that the search “will be a transparent process. There will be no hidden agendas…It will be the board’s responsibility to decide how they want to get the input from the community. I’m assuming…to work out a forum or whatever the board wants to get input from the public and from the teachers… Please be assured it will be transparent. You will know what’s going on. You’ll have input.” Apparently in June, Administrator Assistants was in favor of transparency and seeking teacher and community input, but then by December, they were pleased at the great job the school board did at keeping the search so confidential.

It probably isn’t surprising that the final candidates have been identified. The two finalists were named in a social media post on November 23: 

• Alicia Clevenger, Assistant Superintendent at Lafayette School Corporation
• Shawn Greiner, Superintendent at South Montgomery (one of three districts in Crawfordsville)

The school board hasn’t confirmed that these are the two finalists, but I’ve since asked teachers in each of those districts and it seems to be an open secret that they are the finalists. That the two finalists are both from local school districts doesn’t suggest that there was much of a national dimension to the search, or really even that it was a state-wide search. Again, seeking applications in August and then asking candidates to quit their current job mid-school year just doesn’t seem like a good way to get a great applicant pool. The speculation is that Shawn Greiner got the job because the south Montgomery school board held an emergency executive meeting on November 23 which perhaps indicates that they are now scrambling to appoint an interim superintendent. 

6:56 – Karpick called for communication from the audience on current agenda items (those who had signed up before the meeting began). 

• MaryDell Forbes (teacher at the Jr/Sr HS and prior co-president of the teachers union) spoke about the book Animal Farm and manipulating people through propaganda and the use of words that are “glittering generalities,” words like transparency and freedom. She said that while transparency sounds great, we sometimes need to give up transparency in exchange for the best candidate. She said that doing this search process during the school year has benefits like allowing the finalists to get to know our school system and being easier in terms of budgeting. She then claimed that the school board has been “exceedingly transparent” in the superintendent search process by articulating the reasons for why they are doing things. Forbes claimed that there is a vocal minority who would rather complain than contribute to the process and noted that only 3 people spoke at the August public forum. Claiming to speak for all teachers, she thanked Alan Karpick and the rest of the school board and expressed trust in their decision. I continue to be disappointed that our teachers union leaders don’t focus on improving conditions for our teachers. Instead, they are in a cosy relationship (regulatory capture) with administrators and school board leadership. Class sizes have increased, financial problems brought on by excessive debt resulted in the school board voting to fire first-year teachers at WLES and WLIS in 2019, overall teacher turnover has increased, and applications for open teaching positions were down even before the start of the pandemic. The union response has just been all is well; nothing to see here. It’s very disappointing. It is interesting to note that a far lower percentage of teachers at WLES and WLIS are in the union. Most elementary and intermediate school teachers have a more negative view of the union as compared to high school teachers, though there are a few exceptions.

• Lily Qiao (parent of 2 children in WLCSC) thanked the school board for their time and effort conducting the superintendent search. She quoted Karpick as saying that “it is common practice for superintendent search processes to be confidential.” She argued that this may have been true in the past, but stated that culture has changed. Qiao said that in April 2015 several media outlets reported that our superintendent, Rocky Killion, was one of three finalists in a superintendent search in South Carolina. Karpick confirmed that he was told in advance that Killion was a finalist and Killion received a raise after the announcement. She then quoted Karpick as saying that “our process works well.” She pointed out that in recent searches in Indianapolis, Crowne Pointe, and Bloomington, the finalists were presented to the public and some of the interview process was live streamed. The disclosures and public hearings in our school district fulfill only the minimum requirements of state law. Qiao said that we should do more and adopt better approaches. We have one of the top schools in the state with parents who are devoted to our schools. Can we do more to involve them? Can we pursue excellence? The audience gave her a loud applause. I appreciated her comments and agree with her.

• Lisa Mills – (teacher at the Jr/Sr HS and prior co-president of the teachers union) shared about her experience on the union discussion committee and explained that it is an open discussion between union leaders and administrators. She said that our community elected the school board to manage the schools and that we should trust them. Mills referenced the August public forum where only three people spoke and said that the school board waited for 20 minutes to see if anyone else would come forward to speak. She said that she hopes that more people will come to future school board meetings. Mills said that she doesn’t think anything is happening behind closed doors and hopes that the community will get behind the school board. In our school district, you don’t learn much by attending school board meetings. The school board refuses to release documents in advance and frequently the audience has no idea what is being rubber stamped. It is common for them to vote to approve “changes to school policies” without ever specifying what policies are being changed. I mention this as a partial explanation for why attending school board meetings is uninteresting for many community members who are very interested in our schools. The school board should do better. That both Mills and Forbes referenced a public forum in which three people spoke as evidence that the community isn’t involved enough is ridiculous when 438 people had already provided survey responses to the same request for input. My view is that supporting our school board doesn’t mean sitting silently and trusting them to always take the best action; it means identifying ways to improve our schools and working to bring that change.

7:07 – Ohlhaut asked for approval of the renewal of the property and casualty insurance. The carriers for nearly all the policies are the same, primarily the Astra Insurance Group. There is a new carrier for the cyber liability policy. Unfortunately, the school board refuses to share documents before or at the meeting, so I don’t have anything else to share here. The only way to learn details is to navigate the public document request process.

    Voted 7 out of 7

7:08 – Pettibone gave an update on our school’s Covid response. He said that he was concerned that the state was considering changing the school mask and quarantine rules, but this did not happen. He complimented the community for supporting school Covid policies and then complimented the school board for setting these policies right from the beginning. Pettibone reported that two weeks ago there were 4 reported Covid cases and last week there were 8 (4 students and 4 staff). He noted an increase in student absences, but suggested that this is just because it is also cold and flu season. Pettibone wasn’t here in July 2020 when the school board announced the re-opening plan, but they certainly did not get it right from the beginning. They formed their plan without seeking community input and then even after many parents spoke at the meeting to point out important areas of improvement, they voted to approve the plan without any changes. It was only after community outcry and petitions that the school board changed course and adopted the changes proposed by the community. I wrote about this in my post on transparency. 

7:13 – Pettibone asked for approval of the Personnel Report. Yin commented on the high turnover over the past year. She recommended seeking turnover data from other districts to compare. She said that the board should address this issue. One recommendation is to analyze teacher and staff exit interviews to find out why they are leaving. She also wants to increase compensation, increase the sense of belonging, and provide more recognition to the many staff members working behind the scenes in food service, transportation, crossing guards, and lunch supervisors. At her institution, they recognize staff who have worked at the college for an extended period of time and she suggested that our school district could do something similar. Karpick said he appreciated her comments but said, “this is just a personnel report.” He then said that “those are all things we are working on and trying to address.” Yin first asked for this topic to be addressed at the August 2021 meeting (at time 7:56) and got pushback from Witt and Sloat. I haven’t seen any discussion or action since then, but it is good that Karpick agreed with Yin that high turnover is an issue that needs to be addressed. One very positive change is that starting right after Killion left, the school board started posting the Personnel Report and Accounts Payable to the corporation’s website. My view is that they should make them available before the meeting rather than posting them the day after to enable us to know what the school board is voting on. I noted something from looking at this month’s personnel report: at the November meeting (at time 6:40) Ohlaut said that teachers were only being offered a one-year contract this time because of financial uncertainty in our district. This month’s personnel report indicates that the administrators received two-year contracts. I would have liked to have asked about that. I also think the school board should have asked about the resignation of the WLIS and WLES behavior facilitator. They have not provided an update on special education since the April meeting (at time 6:51).

Voted 7 out of 7

7:15 – Ohlhaut asked for approval of the accounts payable. Ohlhaut does a nice job of trying to point out some of the claims that he thinks may be of interest to the community. This is the best he can do given that the board refuses to share the document before the meeting. Like in our neighboring districts, the community should have access to see how the schools are spending our tax dollars before the school board votes to approve.

    Voted 7 out of 7

7:17 – Board Reports

• Public Schools Foundation – Yin attended the public schools foundation award recognition ceremony for teachers where 8 TSC teachers were recognized
• WL Schools Foundation – Schott shared that they raised $5,000 on Giving Tuesday and will use the money to help with student scholarships, teacher grants, and the backpack program. Six grants for a total of $4,000 were given to teachers in the three schools this semester. He shared how they are moving the alumni wall of pride plaques to the entry way at the high school auditorium and also something about an interactive touch screen display that will be created. 
• Policy Committee – Witt shared that she is working with Springer on updating policies for spring and fall legislation updates. It sounded like Springer and Witt are the only two on the policy committee. Previously Doug Masson volunteered to serve on this committee as a community member and helped revise the policies. I volunteered to serve on the committee in January 2021 but was denied because Springer said they do not allow community members to serve. I pointed out her inconsistency and Karpick wrote me back saying that they had given their response.
• Park Board – Springer reported that Riverside ice skating is open. There was a Farmers Market at the Wellness Center the day before Thanksgiving. This Wednesday, December 8th from 5-7pm is an open house at the Wellness Center about the master plan process.
• GLASS – Springer said they had a meeting on November 16th. GLASS applied for two grants and received one for preschool and hadn’t yet heard about one for school age students. It is a grant from the American rescue plan funding dollars to address learning loss, social emotional learning, and behavioral remediation.
• Board Officers – Karpick shared that Springer will email school board members to gather names for those interested in serving as an officer and they will vote on it at the January meeting. In WLCSC, the school board officers make many decisions without seeking input from the other school board members. For example, at the November meeting (at time 7:19), the school lawyer said that the school board president approves all his work assignments. This apparently happens without asking other school board members.
• Athletic Facilities Tours – Karpick said that some board members visited the athletic facilities with Shriner and Strode and discussed needs. Karpick should have shared more about this discussion. The school board recently borrowed more than the school district’s debt service fund could handle. They had to divert teacher and operations funding (from the referendum funds) to pay for all the recent construction. We still haven’t heard what the future plan is for Happy Hollow. Our school board needs to have a serious conversation about our facilities and our school debt.
• Negotiations – Marley shared that negotiations for the teacher contract finished last month and said that this is the best pay increase that he has seen. 
• Redevelopment (City) – Marley talked about the current construction along Salisbury for installation of pathways and said that Grant Street and then Yeager Road will be next.

7:23 – Karpick invited communication from the audience on non-agenda items (those who had signed up before the meeting began) 

• Troy Janes (a parent) said he appreciated the update on Covid and agrees that the school has done a good job with those policies, but that there are areas where we can do better. He quoted a candidate in the recent Virginia governor’s race, Terry Macaullife, who said that “parents shouldn’t tell schools what to do.” Janes said that some have attributed his election loss to this mindset, which he claims is similar to the mindset of WLCSC school leaders. He hopes the next superintendent will be willing to seek community involvement. Janes said that one needed change is replacing the school corporation’s legal counsel. The school corporation paid over $300,000 in legal fees to Reiling’s firm over the past year. In comparison to peer schools, Carmel Clay paid legal fees of more than $200,000, Noblesville $185,000, and Zionsville $90,000. Those corporations spend between $12 and $17 per student on legal counsel. WLCSC pays $125 per student (10 times higher). He is also concerned that the legal advice the school district is receiving is not what is best for our community. One example is Reiling’s efforts to withhold public information and deny community records requests. This summer the state’s public access counselor ruled that the school board acted improperly in denying access to information regarding the diversity, equity, and inclusion committee. After the decisions, Reiling announced that the public access counselor was wrong and that WLCSC would not change how it operates (although it did shut down the DEI committee). Janes said that the over $100,000 that we pay more than our peer schools in legal fees could be used to give to our teachers more than $500 each to offset the out-of-pocket spending that is typical for teachers. He asked that the school board consider legal representation options that better meet our community’s needs before considering Reiling’s contract in January. I have personally had multiple public records requests denied by our school district. It took me several requests over multiple months to get the complete accounts payable report when I started requesting it a year ago. Currently, I am trying to request the complete school board packet, but they continue to deny the request stating that “the school board packet is not a document.” Reiling has a long history of trying to prevent community member access to public information; see this Journal & Courier story from Dave Bangert in March 2015 for example. Reiling commented at the May meeting (at time 7:29) that he monitors social media to see if any comments that are critical of school leaders cross the line and are defamatory. Paying Reiling $290/hour to browse Facebook seems like a pretty poor use of school funds.

• Angela Janes (a parent of 3) said she wanted to build on what Qiao said. She shared that Administrator Assistance told us in the June meeting (8:06) that this would be a transparent process yet the school board rejected this vision. The survey the school board sent out had a great response but the board hasn’t done anything to show they have used any of the results as they interviewed candidates. She pushed back on the school board’s claim that confidentiality is needed and also referenced Killion’s SC interview and then raise. She pointed out a second example as well, noting that Pettibone, our interim superintendent, was a finalist in a public search in 2015. She then quoted Karpick from the Journal & Courier: “’no sitting superintendent in their right mind would choose transparency’ out of concern for how that knowledge would affect current employment.” She said that having a candidate announced as a finalist in a top school district would be an honor and could result in a raise (as it did for Killion) or at least respect. She said that before hearing that Dr. Alicia Clevenger was a finalist for our superintendent search, she was unaware of her accomplishments and her work with diverse students from special needs to high ability as well as her willingness to collect input from others to inform her decisions. She believes that the best candidate is hired when the community is engaged and input is given to school board members before voting. She echoed Troy Jane’s concern about the high cost of our current legal counsel and shared that she had requested in advance that this be added as an agenda item at this meeting so that the board could discuss options prior to voting on the contract in January. They denied her request and she said that she believes this is because they don’t have any intention of considering other options. In her view, this is a mistake. Our teachers deserve better, and she would vote to spend money on underpaid teachers instead of overpaid attorneys. 

• Erin Moon-Walker (a parent) shared that she acknowledges that she is racist just like everyone on the board and in the room. She stated that there is racism in our school district. She claimed that Yin, the first person of color to be elected to the WLCSC school board, has been mistreated by other school board members. She referred to a social media post by Daniel Afolabi (a WL CARE leader) that presents evidence (see table below) that board members, and in particular Karpick, usually refer to Yin by using her first name (Yue rather than Dr. Yin) while usually referring to all the other board members by using their title (Mrs. Austin rather than Amy). Moon-Walker referenced an episode at the November meeting (at time 7:01) where Witt interrupted Yin and accused her of not trusting Ohlhaut. Karpick supported Witt’s accusation and then both claimed that Yin already had the data she was requesting in her school board packet. Moon-Walker shared an example of a community member of color who had to go to the public access counselor in order to clear up some confusion regarding his public access request and that although he was eventually able to obtain the document, no apology was given. Moon-Walker said that the school board appointed a DEI director that was an existing school employee that makes them feel comfortable and doesn’t challenge them. She said that the DEI director should point out times when school board members are treating Yin with disrespect. She asked that a new DEI committee be formed that includes people who won’t just say yes to administrators, but will make them feel uncomfortable. She thanked the Chinese American community for not giving up on our school district and said “if we can’t do better then we should vote in better.” She asked that Witt and Karpick apologize for their treatment of Yin. The way Witt and Karpick treated Yin at the November meeting was shockingly disrespectful. This is one of the things that drove so many parents to this meeting. I was surprised that neither Karpick nor Witt apologized for having claimed that the data Yin requested was already in their school board packet, when it was not. 

7:35 – Karpick announced the next regular school board meeting would be on Monday, January 10, 2022 at 6:30pm in addition to the superintendent contract hearing on Monday, December 13 at 5:00pm and the vote on the superintendent contract and candidate on December 20 at 5:30pm.

7:36 – Karpick was about to adjourn the meeting when Yin asked if she could say something. Karpick said yes. Yin said that she appreciates Springer’s summary of the search process and agrees that all board members attended all the meetings, however she wanted to clarify that she wasn’t aware that steps were being taken after their last meeting to reject one of the candidates and make a written offer to the other. She shared that when the contract was posted, it was the first time that she saw it. She expressed her desire for all school board members to be informed before these actions are taken. To prepare for the contract writing, she had collected superintendent salary data. When she asked about the contract, she was told that only the school board officers were involved. If she had known, she would have requested to be included in writing the contract. She wants more clarity and transparency ahead of time. Karpick responded that she was in the meeting the whole time and that the other 6 board members all understood the process. Springer said that after the contract was posted on Friday, she sent an email over the weekend explaining the contract process to the school board members. Springer compared it to the teacher contract process with the union team where only Ohlhaut, Sloat, and 2 school board members were involved. The rest of the school board did not see the contract until after the teachers had ratified it and then school board members were allowed to ask questions and make comments at the public hearing. She said the superintendent contract process is the same where only Reiling, Sloat, Ohlhaut, and school board officers (Karpick, Springer, and Marley) had input in the contract. Springer said that the other board members saw the contract for the first time when it was posted. Yin responded by saying she appreciated the email clarification and noted that Springer shared an explanation of this process with all the school board members after Yin asked. Yin said that her not understanding the process is possibly because she is a new member and said that she isn’t complaining about the school board officers, but hopes that they will give more clarification in the future. Karpick responded directly to Yin saying: “we have another board member that has been on the board as long as you have and seems to be able to find that other information out.” I was appalled by Karpick’s response when Yin asked for them to better explain the process. Karpick and Springer were both dismissive of Yin’s concerns. They should have just offered apologies for not having been clearer and perhaps offered some small thing they could do better next time rather than blaming Yin. They don’t seem to be providing good leadership for the school board.

This closing behavior by Karpick and Springer was incredibly discouraging especially after last month and the disrespect from Witt and Karpick when Yin asked to see survey results. Karpick did a great job at this meeting calling Yin by her title like he does with the other board members. However, I think an apology was warranted. When Karpick was asked about his role in addressing Yin, he said, “I asked Dr. Yin on or around her first meeting as a new board member how she preferred to be addressed. She told me at the time she had no preference between being addressed as Dr. Yin versus Yue Yin. So, I proceeded in that manner. I will ask her before tonight’s meeting if her preference has changed or somehow I didn’t understand Dr. Yin’s wishes.” I saw Karpick approach Yin as she walked in and overheard him ask her about her name. It looked like an uncomfortable exchange. I bet Yin really is fine with either. The issue is that Karpick didn’t ask the other 5 board members if they wanted to go by their first name or title, he just usually refers to all of them by their title. Karpick should have been treating all the board members the same, not just those that are part of his RDP PAC. Once again, a simple apology would go a long way.

7:41 – Karpick adjourned the meeting.

Location: Happy Hollow Building, LGI Room

Streaming: WLCSC Board Meeting 12/6/21

Attendance: 7 of 7 School Board Members (Yue Yin, Alan Karpick, Karen Springer, Bradley Marley, Thomas Schott, Rachel Witt, Amy Austin); Ross Sloat, Interim CFO; Stephen Ohlhaut, Assistant to the CFO; Robert Reiling, Jr., Lawyer; Michael Pettibone, Interim Superintendent

Audience:  Administrators, HS teachers from the union, reporter from J&C, WLFI, Dave Bangert, and about 50+ community members. I think even more community members would have attended if school board meetings were not scheduled at the same time as the city council meeting. At the June meeting (at time 7:38 & 7:42), Yin proposed that the school board switch to another evening to encourage more community involvement, but the other school board members all voted to keep things the same.

Future Meetings (calendar link)

• Monday, December 13th at 5pm at Happy Hollow LGI Room – Public Hearing for superintendent contract
• Monday, December 20th at 5:30pm at Happy Hollow LGI Room – SB Vote on superintendent contract and candidate
• Monday, January 10th at 6:30pm at Happy Hollow LGI Room  

This is not the official minutes from the school board meetings. I am a parent of WLCSC students and my thoughts are given in italics. The official minutes are released after the approval of those minutes at the next school board meeting (1 month from now). Previous agendas, minutes, and audio recordings can be found at the WLCSC website.