Board Watch 7.18

Boardwatch
Written By KidsFirst RPS

Happy fourth week of summer, board watchers - only six more to go! Seven of our elected board members got together last night for their only July meeting, and rattled through a lengthy agenda with deliberate speed. Here are the top 5 highlights you should know about:

  • Calendar Adjustments

  • Preschool Changes

  • Construction Updates

  • “Significant” Teacher Vacancies

  • Afterschool Programs 

Calendar Changes

The board and administration heard families and employees loud and clear: the 21-22 school year was too long. The administration had the challenging task of revising the upcoming calendar and, in collaboration with the Teacher Advisory Committee, balancing state mandated instructional time, teacher work days, and the newish, more inclusive list of observed holidays.

In the end, the Board adopted changes to the school calendar to better align our district's student days with neighboring counties’ student days, including ending school on June 6th. You can see the approved 22-23 calendar here:

The proposed revisions were met with came with a few concerns: 

  • When teachers use their vacation time on the days before a holiday, it puts a burden on remaining teacher colleagues who often need to step in to cover for these classes, functionally doubling up classes. This is managed at the school level, often by capping requests out of respect for and acknowledgment of teacher burnout.

  • The 2nd District Rep apparently objected to extending the calendar by including teacher work days for professional development or parent-teacher conferences, desiring instead they be done virtually and outside of contracted hours. Admin position is firm: where teachers are being asked to work, they will be given paid time in the district calendar to do so.

  • Several board members asked about revisiting year round school options. Reluctance here appears to be gambling with teacher morale at a time when the district, state, and country are facing record staff shortages.

Preschool Changes

We’ve heard consistent public comment this year that preschool students and teachers are exhausted from their current, longer academic days. Tonight’s admin proposal shortens the day by an hour, returning to the pre-pandemic length of the school day. 

Teachers will also enjoy the return of duty-free lunch, as the district is already recruiting support staff (like lunch monitors) to do that work instead.

Unfortunately: the early 7:45AM start time remains because of transportation constraints. The district has enough “first student” buses (equipped with car seats) to operate on their own schedule - but they rely on the same, limited drivers to run elementary, middle, and high school routes. (Thankfully, the board-approved increase in Bus driver pay is having the desired effect and recruitment is going well.There’s the potential that driver vacancies all get filled, and the district can offer more flexibility on start times as a result. Fingers crossed!)

Construction Updates

Wythe design process is full steam ahead! 

6,000 community members engaged over the last several months, lending their voices to the debate for a STEM or Arts focus. In the end, students were the tie breakers, preferring an arts focus. 

There’s still an opportunity for students to satisfy their STEM interests, with the admin suggesting that focus for the upcoming Altria Career and technical center.

With a theme secured, we can move forward with strong focus and achieve excellence, or as the board chair suggests, the George Wythe Magic.

Actual construction/site preparation, though, requires relocating a significant utility pipe from under the current athletic fields. Supply chain disruptions are promising significant delays, currently estimated at 6-9 months.

Also suffering supply chain related delays: Clark Springs roof and gym floor repairs. Nevertheless, they are underway, with hopes (not promises) that they’ll be complete around or before the first day of school in the fall.

Much of what we learned about Fox was also shared last week following the 2nd district representative’s Rebuild Fox committee. In the interest of brevity, we won’t repeat them here. We await a fully vetted design contract, which we expect to be introduced for board approval at the next, Aug 1, board meeting.

From “Significant” Teacher Vacancies to Teachertown USA?

With a short 6 weeks left before school starts again, RPS reports 176 classroom teacher vacancies - nearly doubling last year’s staff shortfall. School districts across the state are similarly impacted, with some places reporting a 96% increase in teacher vacancies. The admin worked together with a Teacher Advisory Panel to craft the following solutions:

  • $6k Moving stipend for interested parties currently living 50+ miles away. (Clawback provision helps protect this investment.)

  • Double signing bonus ($4k) for critical shortages.

  • Streamlining hiring by reassigning central office staff to vet candidates.

  • “Grow Our Own” staff by helping current instructional assistants level up.

  • Create a Teacher retention task force.

  • $1k teacher retention bonus in the fall.

You can help spread the word by retweeting this info from the superintendent:

School Board members brought some of their own suggestions to the table, too. We’ll discuss each idea in an upcoming deep dive, but here’s the gist to keep you up to speed: 

Rep Young made several suggestions largely focused on teacher retention via reforming school culture:

  1. Reform Principal and Assistant Principal Evaluations

  2. Empower school specific budget and decision making 

  3. Teacher-choice curriculum 

  4. De-emphasize lesson plans (forest through the trees)

  5. Empower teachers to problem solve as they see fit (product over process)

  6. Limit student access to cell phones

  7. Reduce data collection (address the districts reliance on over-testing)

Rep White suggests signing bonuses for hard to staff schools.

Rep Rizzi wants the district to investigate claims of retaliation. (In case you missed it, anonymous RPS teacher/s came forward with this recent claim, citing retaliation within the LIEP department. That’s our district’s ESL program.) The superintendent had this message to share for all watching:

“If anyone feels they are being retaliated against, I want them to email me directly. Every case that I receive is forwarded to Employee Relations for a full investigation. That is my commitment, and always will be.” (Watch 2:14:20)

The fear of greeting the school year unprepared daunts everyone on the Board: “We’re still brainstorming - and school’s going to open in August,” Burke says. “There’s so much more that we CAN do, and we MUST do, and it’s OVERdue.”

It’s important to note that all these teacher retention and recruitment initiatives will be paid for by federal stimulus. This is the case with other important programs discussed this evening as well - including afterschool care programs. Everyone on stage is wary of what this means - and the tough budget conversations we’ll have over the next 2 years as stimulus funding expires. 

Ms Rizzi believes this is why audits are so important - to help the district “trim the fat” so they can continue to offer critical services and incentives. Perhaps we’ll identify areas for savings, but in under-funded districts like ours it’s not clear that there are significant sums of “fat” to be trimmed. 

After School Programs

City-run After school care programs are returning in the fall via the YMCA and Parks & Rec. These will be offered as needed and with rates on a sliding scale for participating families. 

Additionally, RPS will provide after school enrichment programs that will be designed and coordinated at the school level to meet students’ localized needs. These programs will be paid for with federal stimulus dollars. (See the admin’s afterschool presentation here.) Even preschoolers have access to afterschool care, courtesy federal stimulus and funding from the Robins Foundation. (See pg 4)

Though Jonathan Young is “elated” by this plan, Rep White is concerned about the lack of transportation provided. The superintendent agrees with her concern about equitable access - but, as we’ve discussed here. the district and the region have ongoing issues with hiring and retaining bus drivers. Perhaps successful recruitment efforts there can also solve this inequity.

Things we’re watching:

  • The next staffing report, and the impact of recruitment incentives

  • Exit survey data/teacher satisfaction data

  • Contract adoption for the reconstruction of Fox 

  • Joint meeting with City Council (Time/agenda TBD) to discuss the Arthur Ashe Center. New to the debate? Catch-up here.

  • Facilities department consultation

  • Documents from the School Board Governance Retreat. (Check the documents we linked last week for a primer of this convo.)

KidsFirst RPS
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