School board meets ahead of academic year

By Ashley Luthans

St. Joseph School District Board of Education members took part in a retreat Monday to discuss the upcoming school year.

Board President LaTonya Williams led the meeting. Williams explained that the purpose of the meeting was to get all school board members on the same page.

“(It’s a) kickoff meeting,” Williams said. “It’s like a retreat in order to come together, to go over some information on the district. In order to learn about every office in the district, taking a look at the org charts, asking questions about the jobs and the job duties and the descriptions and things … Just a collaborative effort amongst the board members in order to begin to prepare for the new school year.”

Williams shared the importance of meeting before the school year starts.

“I think it’s important in order to meet before the school year starts in order to begin on an even playing field,” Williams said. “All of us completely understand our jobs and our expectations. And then I think that it will enable us to be able to understand the roles more, our positions more.”

One of the items on the agenda for the daylong meeting was to discuss board norms and policies.

“We pretty much took the original norms and adjusted them in order to make them make more sense,” Williams said.

A norm that was addressed was adding that the board supports the best interest of students, teachers and staff. Before, it was only students and teachers mentioned.

Another item addressed was the fourth norm, which stated that school board decisions should not be based on public opinion. Board member Whitney Lanning brought up the point that some families may have children that need special assistance, and therefore should get a say in some policies.

There was a new norm added about the importance of supporting SJSD as a public prekindergarten-12 school district.

At the retreat, there was also a presentation from Duane Martin and Rachel Meystedt of EdCounsel LLC that went over Sunshine law.

Williams added that hopefully the meeting was able to address some misconceptions.

“I think the meeting was very important in a lot of different ways,” Williams said. “Because we were able to clear up a lot of public misconceptions, a lot of questions about policies that others in the community are always asking about. And we are able to come together as a board and work together as a board. I think a lot of times, people on the outside only look at the problems of the board and the issues of the board. But they’re not looking at the work the board’s doing and the positive impact that the board is able to have on the district and on the community. And so, I think that it’s important for everyone to be able to look at us collaborating as a team and working together as one.”

There will be a special Board of Education meeting on Aug. 5.