001that one represent. Go ahead, Margaret. All right. So, this is the June 16th, 2025 HR committee meeting. It's starting at 5:30 p.m. Dan Boltner will be attending today, but he's going to be showing up a little late. If we could um I'll stand and do the Pledge of Allegiance first if everybody's good at that. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right. So, the first thing up is the consent agenda for uh and hiring process for certified staff. So, we have a handout with the um names of the certified staff that have been hired since the last meeting or have been have tenative offers extended to them on behalf of
002the board. Um we we did have a couple of staff resignations. U I would point out that this consent agenda includes the principal of the high school but as all of you were notified earlier today and um this will be on the June 23rd board meeting. Principal Mark gets from Leap and Lebanon. Leap LEAP in Lebanon and Lincoln STEM elementary schools has also resigned effective June. So, that will be one change that we already know will be on uh the June 23rd consent agenda. We've had a few resignations uh that happened with certified staff since the last time we met and then um a number of certified staff hires, potential hires that have been extended tenative offers for contracts beginning in 2526. Many of these in recognition of our financial situation are one-year or what
003LTE contracts where they will be working for us full-time eligible for contract pay and benefits but that have no expectation of renewal renewal in 2627. So that's what when you see the designation one year that's what the one-year designation is. others. We felt uh that we were um sure enough about their continued employment that they'll be issued contracts that are considered regular contracts, which means that if they weren't continued in 2627, we would go through a non-renewal process similar to what we had gone through earlier this spring for those of you that have been around for that process. So, um we do have the hiring process for certified staff on deck. as a later topic of discussion. So, I don't know if you want to proceed with recommending that this consent agenda be forwarded to
004the board for approval as a res resolution or if you want to hold off on that until we have completed the discussion related to hiring processes for administrators and certified staff which is later in the discussion. So, okay, I've deferred to you as the chair. Um, unless I hear anybody suggest otherwise, I don't see a problem with moving moving it forward to unless any specific board member feels like there needs to be a closed meeting about any of the individuals noted on the documents. I guess a question I just have and it's just a question is kind of where we're at and I don't know if that's what we're covering in E regarding current policy versus maybe what the ambition is regarding that because I know at the full board meeting in May we had
005three individual certified staff that we went through and individually reviewed each of their their contract with this it's a full con consent agenda so it doesn't seem to just align with the process we used last meeting so just seeking to understand where we're at. So my understanding is tonight we're going to be discussing how the board wants to move forward in the future for all certified staff members and that would be discussed on E. So I have no problem holding off on this consent agenda until the full the full committee discussion in E. Um but there is um there is no standard practice built yet. will say the board still needs to discuss how they would like to move forward in the future involving themselves with hiring administrators and certified staff employees. So there's no
006existing policy for how we hire certified staff. I'm trying to look back through policy and obviously there are a lot that could be associated with the process. My understanding is historically, and Craig please correct me if I'm wrong, is historically the board was not really engaged at all in hiring or yes, it was just we would take the re recommendation of administration and move forward that way. Now, um Craig would be able to speak on if it in the past they did, you know, have closed sessions on occasion. I'm not sure. Craig. Um, yeah, I think as a as a matter of making sure that we're closing the loop completely, that's hopefully where the discussion comes in where um in the past if the if the staff brought a recommendation to the board um it
007can sometimes look very clunky because you know that recommendation also implies an approval. So if the board doesn't feel like that's an approval worth moving that that the board would feel comfortable with whether it's the um within the uh process or whatnot. Um then then the board would probably decide hey listen we want to explore I'm not articulating this well sorry uh when when when an approval is sought of the board the board does have that authority to say no essentially so instead of having the administration get a no maybe we can come together with a particular process that would be mutually beneficial and I guess that would be the u the the intention moving forward. just didn't know if there was a current administrative guideline or policy in place as to the the process
008because when I tried to look I mean obviously for those of you who are newer maybe you can identify it's like which of them are are miola that might be passed as part of this book what are currently in place as water town policies what so just just seeking clarification to understand more than anything else Margaret can you speak on that at all from an administrative guideline I can point there is no administrative guideline that has been documented for the district. I mean I can speak to the practice which has been that the consent agenda has been previewed by the HR committee um for review. There would be occasional general questions but most cases the consent agenda was recommended for approval to be forwarded to as a resolution to the next week's board meeting. Um
009if there were questions about individual candidates, those of course would have to be discussed in close session and that was a relatively rare occurrence. So um in I mean that has been the usual practice. I mean from an in from an internal operating standpoint we have a process that is well established and um used consistently by all of our hiring administrators. But I can't say that there is a documented administrative guideline. So the NEOA policies come with administrative guidelines. That's not something that we've had in the past. We've had a rather generalized book of policy as I'm sure you've noted. Um and and and so um that has been the practice. it's been consistently used, but if there was a board member who had a concern about somebody, then that would be pulled off of
010the agenda and then forwarded to a close session discussion meeting for the entire board the final the following Monday. So, the process would be to contact you then and then it becomes part of the HR agenda first and then the full board agenda generally. I'm sorry to be so Yeah. Well, we have we have not ever gone into close session to discuss individual hires. in in the HR committee that has been like that would be pulled out of the consent agenda like a board member would say well I'll approve the consent agenda with the exception of whoever and I would like that that hire to be placed on a close session agenda item for the entire board. Okay. Thank you for the clarification. Thank you everyone for entertaining the conversation. Yeah, if uh if I
011may. It's um policy current policy 4113. It says all all of the districts recruitment, selection, and hiring practices and procedures are subject to and guided by the district's commitment to non-dis non-discrimination and equal opportunity employment as further identified and related board policies. The primary goals of these processes should shall be to attract identify diverse range of highly qualified candidates who if hired will demonstrate a high degree of commitment to the district's mission, district's goals and their assigned duties and responsibilities and who will also make positive personal and professional contributions to the district. The recruitment and the hiring for all positions of employment in the district except for the position of superintendent shall be conducted in the in accordance with the provisions of this policy. The superintendent shall ensure that the district's practices, procedures surrounding recruitment,
012selection, and hiring are well defined and implemented consistently. Different practices and procedures may as may be defined for different types of positions. The board will make the final decision to approve or not approve the hiring of any employee. Any preliminary offer of employment or any offer of a contract shall be contingent on obtaining a board approval. Um the superintendent determines if uh there is an urgent need to fill a position or that another exceptional and good cause exists. Standard practices may be modified for all potential candidates by shortening the standard application period, eliminating multiple interview levels or consisting in interimm appointments. However, under no circumstance under no circumstances shall an employee be hired without one participating in an interview, two completing a physical examination with satisfactory results. um three for the positions either of the
013following the district has completed lensure reference and so on. Uh so so basically it's a broad policy but it also states that the board will make the final decision to approve or not approve in the hiring of any employee. So um perhaps there has been a practice uh of of acce accepting uh recommendations from the uh from the administration. However, that does not preclude the board from uh stepping in and intervening when they see uh a desire differently uh a desired result differently than the administrative recommendation. No, absolutely. like like you said, just wanting to understand that because I'm I'm a very riskadverse individual. So, as as someone who sits here, I just want to make sure that we're consistent in how we're enforcing the policy so that it's not setting up the district for
014any liability. So, that's all. Sure. So, have we adopted that policy? This is our current policy. Okay. Right now, we're in the process of making adjustments to that policy. So, I guess I'll ask um Carl and Dan, uh do you want to hold off with putting the consent agendas forward for resolution until after our discussion on how we're going to move forward? I'd say yes. Okay. Makes no difference. Okay. We'll just we'll hold off with that. And then the for A and B, correct? For um for the consent agenda. And then there's a complimentary docu document which references the support staff that have been extended offers and been hired under um the superintendent's direction for most of these are summer appointments or um um potential appointments or fall. Um it I'll just say that these
015folks have already started and are working as for the most part lawn and summer cleaners in our various buildings. And so those do not in general go to the board any longer. They go to um HR committee and then are issued notices of employment which was a board decision that or board and HR decision that was made a few months back regarding the content of the consent agenda. Yes, I recall that we weren't going to get involved with non-certified supports. Yeah. Yeah. So that's all I have on that topic. Okay. So then we're at the USI update and planning health insurance. Sorry, we're at the summer school. Just as just a note on the summer school. So these are the latest and probably the last group of summer school hires that you'll see coming through
016for this summer absent any unusual or unexpected resignations or things like that. We do hold off on and um committing to hire special ed pair of professionals until we know what the case load is or and what the needs will be for those individual students that are enrolled in summer school. So that's why you see a whole list of them, whereas you saw bigger lists earlier in spring related to other summer school assignments, but that's a needsbased hiring. And um it's too early in in March and April and May to know what our needs are going to be with this particular um set of employees. So that's uh the summer school agenda. So now we're on. All right. So now we're on CUSI update and planning for health insurance. So I'd like to introduce all
017of you who have not met him, Al Jagger, who is our uh USI benefits advisor and uh benefits broker. he is here to do a presentation for you related to um the USI uh kind of a status report on where we are at with respect to uh our the performance of our um our uh health and and dental insurance plans. I will get that that presentation had been shared earlier this week with all of you and in the administrative content section and I'll pull it up on the board here in a minute um so that you can all I'll see I can certainly speak to it while you're doing that. You can go ahead Al. All right. Well, I appreciate the um the discussion and opportunity. Um in the end the presentation that you had
018already been been shared with you speaks to first and foremost it's not just me that is the independent advisor that the district hired. You'll see on the first slide a whole team page that we have and that team page represents individuals that not only are service but as well as compliance for the sake of benefits but also actuaries uh behavior health the benefit um you go down the list contractual for pharmacy contracting contracts for uh provider contracting and my point to all that is uh we have a lot of individuals that uh when we are negotiating on your behalf independently recognizing best practices and challenging whatever vendor you currently have or are looking to have the equation. So that's the point of this slide is it's not just me. Um the next slide speaks to
019the agenda and where we were where we are um the process moving forward and the timeline moving forward. So, you know, in the where we were category, we'll talk through a little bit in terms of we were self-funded. Um, we had transition to courts and um we we've been dealing with an uh January 1 is our contract start date. So, every year we're on a calendar year for the contracts that we sign with our respective vendors for benefits. you want to advance to the next slide. Um expanding on the um where we were type thing when we did transition from self-funding to fully insured um with quartz. We spent a fair amount of time looking at provider disruption. We spent a fair amount of time looking at all the different options and courts aligned favorably
020to our staff member provider alignment. And so there was minimal disruption and we were able to save a million dollars, a little over a million dollars to minimize that disruption. Uh we have rate caps and as you see on the rate caps we have a second third uh multi-year rate caps by the way those days are gone unfortunately um dealing with the volatility in the health in the provider world and the prescription world but we we benefited from that significantly. Um our most recent renewal for this current calendar year we did have a 9% uh we did tweak the deductibles and the specific outline notes that um in each category we have three plans that are offered most all the individuals are in the high deductible plan the second one but uh the deductible tweak
021for example 1100 single 2200 family on the u one plan design converted to 1300 single 2600 family and you see subsequent the other plan design categories. Uh you see the respective plan design changes to get those ultimately the rate increased 9% down to six a little over 6% in those plan. Uh the one plan design did remain the same but the the summary takeaway which is the plan where most everyone is in uh is currently 3% higher than when we originally transitioned from self-funded to. So, um I'd say overall we've been outperforming the norm by a fair amount when you look at it from that financial standpoint where we are. So, we are um when we look at um the loss ratios um 95.8%. What does that mean? For every dollar that we are paying
022in courts, they are seeing 95.8 cents going out in expenditures for health care. That's not that's not including administrative cost. So if we use the rule of thumb of about 10% administrative cost that they use toward um you know paying their staff and paying for their overhead. uh this would be uh on the higher end of the expenditures and the one area that has gone up are ancillary services and prescriptions um from the prior year. So these are things we pay attention to that are the cost drivers. Prescriptions are consistent with most all employers of any size. And then the other is the spike in high cost claimments that tends to be a a big driver. And what we notice on members, you know, we look at what percent of the claims do tend top
02310 individuals represent about 17% of overall paid claims. They only represent, you know, less than a percent of the overall member of the overall membership. Um, and four of the the top 10 are predicted to have in excess of $100,000. Why is that important? It just speaks to the fact that okay you're the ideal number is under 90% medical loss ratio and are we going to get some relief because maybe some of the high-c cost claimants are no longer high cost claimants and the short answer is not from that category. So, um, just have a quick question. Do you know by chance what some of the the high claims are, seeing as we're not getting employee names, associations, just to see if there was something like a an incentivized wellness program that could help address
024some of those top claimant related issues there. I don't have that with me. Do we receive that? Yes. And do we uh constantly revisit how what are some strategies? What are some approaches to um be proactive to mitigate those from re you know occurring in the first place or reoccurring? Yes. Questions. What are the typical trends? Are they surgeries? Are they autoimmune? What are they? Um cancer is probably the most consistent in terms of category but um you know various specialty drugs certainly um you know when you speak to autoimmune we'll see that flare up. Um but beyond that, um I'm just trying to think maybe the the biggest uh areas that are able to be addressed would be msk muscoskeleletal type things. So you know um back problems. Um so what is it's one
025thing to recognize the large claim it's another thing to recognize what can we mitigate and the areas that we can mitigate include at muscular skeletal behavior health um and when we look at employers as a group of area districts we look at this throughout the CISO footprint and statewide then nationwide look at all the best practices um and you know from from a preventative standpoint, behavioral health, muscular, skeletal, and then after that, um, just having the preventative screening is just getting that engagement, making as much as possible challenging the health system to have everyone be age, gender appropriate screenings occurring. And is this inclusive of of physical health as well as mental health or a benefits? The behavior health. Yeah. Okay. Absolutely. All right. Um so after the high cost claimment slide when we look
026at where from a year-over-year standpoint um year-to-ate claims that are reported and recognized we compare last year to this year and what you see is we're actually doing a little bit better in the first couple of months uh most recent months. um also sameish uh from a loss ratio standpoint and as a result when we look at that uh as as well as the large cost claimments that's when we start looking at planning forward you want to forward on the slides um we know that we want to outperform uh budget, right? So, levers that can be pulled in that regard in addition to our actuaries independent challenging the health plan as well as challenging uh their pharmaceutical and other approaches. They being courts. Uh we can also use levers um that plan design changes are
027always a consideration or we can go out to market. we can just let courts know that hey, you know, if you can't um become more aggressive on certain areas that are um I'd say you're not achieving the norm. Um we can go out to market and those market options would include both self-funded, fully insured and we always also look at the ETF, estate plan and other considerations as well. So, we don't know if we kept courts, like if we kept courts as is, we don't know if it would be within our budget target or not yet. I would say we don't know through the rest. We don't know for sure. Okay. Okay. But based on the fact of how you're running compared to um last year, we have a good argument to negotiate that we
028should be able to be at least where we were last year. And if you recall that was roughly nine right around that 9%. Okay. All right. Thank you. Um so and we work with the administration as far as best strategy for short-term long-term solutions and administration you know work with them bring forward the administration brings the options forward to the committee uh that the budget target. Margaret, anything I No. And usually we bring those options forward in in um right around August, right? That's usually our window. And then the plan itself in terms of whatever action is taken. um we bring the options forward in August uh for review decisions are are more or less finalized and then the final approval for that occurs at the um October meeting which is more or less just
029a like a ministerial approval based on what was decided at the August meeting or it shouldn't like the October piece of this process should not contain any surprises is okay. This just speaks to we don't just look at based on our size. We don't look at assurance like a commodity. In other words, how do we focus on the negotiation with the providers? And this speaks to if you're a provider, hospital, clinic, whatever, you're looking at this continuum as would we and seeing, okay, how can we best negotiate as an employer for the best options? And when we were self-funded, we were on more of the left end of the spectrum, fee for service. What does that mean? every time a staff member that was on the plan had a claim for the respective CPT code
030or procedure you know procedure code um there was a cost associated with it and over the course of time every time that procedure the billing would come we would reimburse the the the provider the accordingly and at the end of the year you know you add it all up and based on the contract of fee for service versus capitation which is we prepay Quartz who's owned by Aurora who's owned by UW we ultimately prepay them a a dollar amount which is scheduled I'll use UW as an example our best self-funded contract that we can access with UW is about 20% higher reimbursement for for the same unit cost as what ports is able to contract with UW. As a result, when 90% of your premiums are going toward claims, it's real hard to outperform that
031option. Doesn't mean we can't just in just a point of this continuum that we're looking all the time at at the different provider contracts, at the different approaches, and ultimately at the different outcomes. the last slide and I apologize I went through this quick and certainly take as many questions as you so choose but uh this speaks to um next review be should be able to mid mid July get some of the first um pricing and if you're wondering for a January through December contract if you're feeling that July is kind of early in the world of insurance to get numbers. Short answer is it is. But the good news is it's a worst case scenario that we get from ports in terms of commitment on their uh pricing for the upcoming year and that's
032when administratively can decide um you know what makes the most sense for the next steps and request for information. uh if necessary, July 21st would be when we'd send out that RFI uh for responses from the different carrier options of spectrum with an understanding August is when it would be due. Um and an understanding that the HR committee in the August 18th date would have the options summarized and early September the objective would be to have a decision so that come you know in board action as necessary. Um, October is when staff members are educated on what their plan is for the following year and in November is when they do the actual enrollment. And then um the actual contract year takes place January 1st. I know that was a lot. I also know you
033have a lot in your agenda, so I wanted to be as concise as possible. I don't have any questions at this. Thank you for the information. I do appreciate it. Very compact, very clearly explained. Thank you, Al. Thank you. So, we will next see see you here in August and you'll have pre presentations for us and a better idea of what our um options might be at that time. Correct. Thanks. We'll put you on our calendar. Yes. Looking forward to it. Have a good evening. Thank you. Well, thank you. Right. So now we have D board member responsibilities and personnel matters. So for this part of the agenda we had invited Brian Waterman. Do you want to come on up to the table, Brian, and join us um to to uh give us the um
034some professional development in these important topics. Thanks, Mario. And good to be with everybody tonight. Um I always say that these kinds of I don't know what you want to call them, workshops or um you know, in services or my favorite way to interact with words, you know, so often people are seeing me because there's a tough decision to be made or a problem. So, um it's nice to be able to get some time and talk a little bit about um in this case board responsibilities and board member roles in various personalities. Um and so, you know, I'm going to talk about a handful of ways that uh boards primarily engage in those things. Some of that is large topic is what you guys have on the agenda tonight, which is um setting policy for
035how various different hiring processes are to to go. That's going to be an important topic that we talk about later tonight. Um, and I believe you want me to stick around for that as well, Margaret. Um, I think so. Yeah. Okay. I'm glad to do that. Um, so I always start whenever I'm talking about board rules regarding any topic, and this is no exception, I always start with where does the board get its authority from. And the good news is that the board's power um, it has broad discretion, right? So under uh section 1212 and 123 it talks about various powers and then duties and the powers are many and um and pretty broad in a lot of cases. So you have great discretion as a board. The key though is that the the board
036is the one with the power. The board or the committee in some cases that's been it's been delegated by the board. Um individual board members don't have any individual authority by statute. Um, now there's some things, you know, some roles such as officers, presidents, transport, things like that that have certain roles. Um, but for the most part, we look to the authority of the board or the committee as a body, as a governing body. And this is reflected in some of your board policy. Tonight, as I talk through some of these issues, I'll reference some of those policies. And I know you guys are in the process of converting to some as well. And um they really have similar on this topic at least. They really have some similar policies. But your board policy 8310,
037board member authority and responsibilities is just one I pulled out here that says while elected as individuals, the board acts collectively to govern the district as informed representatives of the citizenship. Individual members of the board do not possess the powers that reside in the full board of education. And that's not just by policy. The policy reflects the statute. That's what the statute says. So something to keep in mind as we go through these, we're really talking about um the board and its role. We'll talk a little bit about individual board members and why best practice what best practices are for individual board members as they participate in that process. But that's just kind of the lens we're going to look through a lot of these issues with is that board power. And again, that board
038power is very broad. Um the other topic I like to talk about when I talk about board involvement or board member involvement in various topics is um the policy governance model. So your policies reflect um what most districts engage in which is a a policy governance model. That means that the board sets the policy and then you hire administration then to carry out those desires that are expressed in the policy. So you conduct oversight of the superintendent, oversight of the various processes such as the hiring process um through the use of policy. And we'll talk about other areas um again hiring, discipline, things like that. But really that policy mechanism where you act as a legislative body, that's really probably the most important role that the board duties play. Um and the greatest way that
039you can set those expectations for the administration because they're always looking for regarding to the topic, what are our parameters? Um and they have a lot of discretion exercise there. So it's helpful when the board has clear policies that set forth those processes that that expects a superintendent and its administration. So the superintendent acts kind of like a CEO and runs the operations the districts within those parameters that I just talked about. And that's also that concept that policy governance model concept is also reflected in your policies. And just to site a few, board policy 22000, central administration supervisory personnel. Um those policies like 2210 and 2211 that talk about the role of the superintendent. Um even your organizational chart under 2500. Uh if you look at that organizational chart, it has the superintendent um
040answering to the board and the board answering to the electorate um which is how you see most organizational charts for school districts. Whereas then the uh the remainder of the workforce really answers to the superintendent again who's carrying out the desires of the board as reflected in the policy. Um board operational goals under 8110. I can go on um but I think you get the idea. It's also listed under all those board operational goals, code of ethics and board administrator relations. So you find it really when you talk about the role of the superintendent but also the role of the board and those board operational policies. And again, that reflects that that same concept. So, any questions on those first two topics that kind of set the stage for the for the rest. Okay. So,
041let's talk about hiring a little bit. Um, I think I mentioned I think I heard somebody mention earlier that support staff like at will employment is handled by the administration. Is that right? That's how it's currently set up. Yes. Yes. Okay. Um, and I'd say that's probably pretty typical, um, is that those types of hiring arrangements um, are delegated to the administration. That's not, it doesn't have to be that way. Um, but that is the way, um, most districts do it. With regard to certified staff, so administrators, teachers, um, that's when the board has, um, direct authority by statute to contract with those individuals. And that's why the board plays such an important role in that process is because the statutes say that the contract which is required by certified staff is with the board.
042It doesn't just say district, it says the board. And so the board has the ultimate say. Now by policy um you know as you guys have been talking about there's a process involved by which the administration carries out that process and then makes a recommendation to the board. um your policies as they stand now reflect that the board and again this is common but the board couldn't for instance go out and just um identify its own individual that they want to bring forth for um for employment regarding certified staff. It's at the recommendation of the administration. So that ensures that there's a process involved that the administration is doing the leg work but then they bring it to you and as mentioned earlier you have to say yes or no no regarding that particular contract
043that particular industry and so again going back to that policy idea it's it's important and I think it's great that you guys are taking up that issue of all right what do we want to see that process look like um because then that gives the administration clear direction. Um, so we talked about teacher administrator contracts. Those are by statute 11821824 that says those have to be with the board. Um, and there's details about what those contracts look like that I'm sure you're familiar with. The number the duration of those contracts and such. So there's certain things that we can uh that we can't address by policy, but most of the process rather than the substance of those contracts can be determined by policy by the board disciplines. is the next topic that I wanted to
044talk a little bit about. So, um it's important when it comes to dis most discipline is handled at the administrative level um until you get uh to termination in which case I'll talk about in a second but there's a number of due process rights that involve the board both both pre-termination and post-termination. Um, and those are are things that are grant due process that's granted by contract, that's granted by policy, that's granted by statute in some cases, and certainly um by constitutional due process. But I think one of the takeaways here is that um it it's important, and this is true in a lot of matters, not just employment context, but it's important that individual board members um honor that policy governance model be because there's a number of things that can go wrong if
045you don't. And the greatest example I see I work with about 30 different districts. So, I see a lot of what works and what doesn't work on boards. And sometimes when board members um they they want to be responsive to their constituency, right? Somebody brings you a complaint um or an issue and you want to help them. And some board members will take the approach that well, you know, it's my it's my opportunity to dig into those issues and find out what's going on so they can help them. But in a lot of cases that backfires and the reason it backfires is because you ultimately may have a say when that issue reaches you as a member of the board. Um so a hiring process or a grievance process or in this case we're talking
046about discipline. Um so if it's a termination and if you're taking it upon yourself to be the investigator for instance and kind of getting in the weeds on some of those issues no matter how well intentioned it can actually go to preclude you from participation. So you you might be in a spot where you'd be subjecting yourself to claims of bias or prejudgment before it gets to the board uh for determination or and in which case you might have to recuse yourself or if you don't recuse yourself it might jeopardize the legitimacy or the credibility of the board decision. Um and and so not only is it kind of out of self-interest for you and for the organization, but the other the other concept is that I always say, you know, how can you best
047help somebody, a constituent who comes to you with a complaint, whether it's complain about a staff member or anything else is really by getting them in contact with the people who can address that situation. And that's typically the administration. Yeah. Great. um in that particular instance where where there's a desire or a feeling that a board member should recuse themselves of of a particular matter. Um how does what does that look like and how does that come come up? Yeah, good question. So it's ultimately it's up to each individual um elected official. So the district can't say to a board member for instance, you need to recuse yourself. Um it's a determination. Now certainly you know they can contact legal counsel and we can talk through that and say well is this really a conflict
048or is it not you know is there prejudgment and sometimes it's just the perception of it but in a practical sense you make that decision as an elected official um because the liability also is would be um attached to the individual as well and that can look like different things. Sometimes that's just abstaining from the vote. Sometimes that's abstaining from the discussion. um there's not a lot of clear bright line rules on what it means. Um and sometimes you can have, you know, like a code of ethics violation or or potential code of ethics violation for the Wisconsin statutes or your policy which echoes it. And other times it's just a perception, right? Sometimes the optics are bad and you say, you know what, I have a prior relationship with the this family or outside
049of this or this employee. I you know, they're they're a friend or an acquaintance of mine. I don't want to do anything to jeopardize that process. So I'm going to announce to my fellow board members I'm abstaining from this discussion or this bill. So in the event that you know a staff member or a parent or constituent brings brings a concern to you as a board member and you um you you're informed of the situation and you decide then not decide but you redirect that particular uh constituent went to the administration to handle the situation. Um, how how would how would that um what does that look like in that particular situation? Because at at that point in time, it doesn't it seems like you have firsthand knowledge of the situation. However, you're not necessarily
050passing judgment one way or another or bias in any particular direction. Yeah, I think that's just fine. And I think that's the best practice what you just described here is okay, I may have some knowledge because they came to me. That's natural. Your constituents are going to come to you and say, you know, hey, I've got this issue with this employee or I've got this issue with my kid. And so it's it's fine to take in that information. But then as soon as they do, I wouldn't ask a lot more questions. I wouldn't dig. I would say, you know what, this sounds like something that is important and that I want to make sure gets in the hands of the people who can help you best. So, I'm going to put you in contact with
051Jared or whoever in the administration can can help um accomplish that. And you know, and then it's fine if you want to follow up with administration and say, "Hey, that thing that I sent to you, I don't need to know details, but you know, did it get taken care of? Is it in the works?" You know, that kind of thing. That's completely fine. Okay? You know, because I I I never want to tell board members, hey, you can't be responsive to your constituents. That's why they put you there. It's just a matter of getting it to the right person and then making sure that you're not jeopardizing your ability to participate later on. Uh I have a kind of a follow-up question. Um and I'm just curious because I actually saw this a while ago.
052I was looking through the state statutes for something else and I happened upon this bit. It's uh 11822 subsection 3 and it says uh in the history section it says under subsection 2 a board has the exclusive right to hire and fire a teacher due process does not require that the board be an impartial decision maker and so that's what can you give me a little bit of context because it seems like that's kind of the opposite of what I generally hear. Yeah, I it's I think it's nuanced. I understand what they're saying and I do agree with that. The idea is that if someone brings a claim later on for wrongful termination, they can't say, well, look, the very, you know, the board that terminated me is, for instance, the same board that's going
053to be involved in the grievance process or the board that's terminated me is the same one that is aware of uh a disciplinary issue that I had previously. And it's like, well, that's the nature of the employment relationship. So to some extent, I mean, you want to insulate yourself to the extent you can so that you don't um run into due process issues. At the same time, I think it was challenged legally and that's best practice. It was challenged legally, I think you could probably make a really good defense. Okay. Gotcha. Gotcha. Thanks. I appreciate it. I was I've been puzzling over that for like six months. That's a great question. That's a great question. Um and and because sometimes you've seen where um especially pre-act 10 when unions were more engaged in general, there
054would be a challenge to everything the board did to say, well, you're biased. And I think that, you know, that's kind of a response to that to say, well, look, they're the employer. I mean, the board is the one who employs the certified staff, so they're going to make judgments. Um, but I just think it's best on the front end to just not involve yourself in the the details so that you can have that fresh and objective picture when it comes to you eventually. Sure. Thanks. Yeah. So, I have a question. Sure. So, long a long time ago, um, uh, as a parent, we had a problem with a teacher being inappropriate with his students, his female students, right? Um, and and not knowing how any of this works as a parent, I followed my
055board member, right? I also I also I'm I'm a military, so I went up the chain of command and when I got near the top, no one would call me back, right? So, as a the board members were incredibly unresponsive, lots of sympathetic listening, no action, right? So, say someone came to me with that today, right? What is the best response for a board member dealing with that problem? That's a great question because I see that too, right? And the answer is is if your administration is not being responsive, if you've already taken the steps I just said and they're not being responsive, then it becomes a board matter. It becomes an oversight of the administration. And so, you bring that to the board. might hold a closed session to say, "Look, you know, here's
056a problem that I've handed off to administration because that's what I'm supposed to do." They're not responding. They're not handling the issue. Now, it becomes an issue of, you know, oversight over the administration. So, there is a action you can take. Definitely. And that's that's a great way to point out the fact that again, you as the individual board member don't have the power to um you know, to hold accountable those who might be dropping the ball. um but the board does as a as a body and it also helps because oftentimes it's not as if there's not just one side of the story, right? So you go into close session to talk about that issue and you get to hear as well from the whole board does or the whole committee gets to hear
057from the administration who says well wait there's a different story here that you may not be understanding and here's what all the steps we've taken and you know then you get both sides but you do it as a bot. Um, okay. So, I think I I handle most of the disciplinary issues. Like I said, terminations and grievances are where you're going to see this. You got to do grievance policy is a little different than most where um it does have uh in the cases of termination um a full-blown evidentiary hearing, not just an IHO step. Um so, that's a bit unusual, but that means you're even more involved um than you typically would. um you do still only review the record under your grievance policy when it comes to more minor discipline, but there are
058greater um um greater due process rights in the grievance in your grievance procedure than others that involve the board more heavily. So something to keep in mind. Um okay, termination um non-renewals and layoffs. So termination, we talked a little bit about that. Certified staff especially, they have uh due process every from everything from their contracts to statute. um to constitutional due process. That's why in the event of a termination, they have a hearing before the board, a due process hearing pre-termination, they also then post termination have access to that grievance procedure. In both cases, you guys the decision makers as the board. And so that's why again it's important to maintain that neutrality until the issue comes to you. Along those lines, I'll say one of the toughest things I always think for a superintendent
059is how much information on personnel matters do I give my board knowing that I want to insulate them a bit so that it doesn't jeopardize their ability to participate, but also so that if something's high-profile, you're not get blindsided, right, with reporters or members of the public who say, "Hey, what's going on here?" And you haven't even heard about it. And so I always think that's really one of the tough balancing acts of a superintendent when they say, "Okay, I I need to let my board know about maybe it's a, you know, not every discipline that might happen, but things that they know are going to get some traction or could bubble up and they want to give you guys a heads up." Telling you about that without giving you so much detail or it's
060going to cause problems in the future. Um, the non-renewal process, you guys just went through it, so you have an idea that that is also something um that's governed by statute. Um, so that's something that you participate in. Again, uh, generally we look at it as whoever has the hiring authority typically also has the firing authority. So because that contract is between you guys as a board and the employee, the um, certified employee, that decision has to be made whether it's termination or non-renewal. Um, that has to be made by you as a board as a governing body. Layoffs are another issue. I don't know if you guys have faced this. A lot of districts haven't in a long time as they see declining enrollment in some districts. I've seen a lot of this pop
061up. Um layoffs are something that there's a lot of um there's not a lot of direction on as far as what that due process looks like. So generally it's governed by something that any language that might be in your contract addressing it um or any language that might be in your policies. But just know that typically layoffs are viewed at viewed as different from your normal termination or even a non-renewal. Although the safest bet is to do a layoff as an unenrolled but again the board participates in that decision. Why? Because at least with certified staff um you're the ones who hired so you also have the ability to to lay them off. Um and then finally the grievance procedure. I talked a little bit about it. Um but it's just it's another thing to
062have in mind uh as you participate in that type of thing. It doesn't you don't see a lot of grievance procedures grie I should say grievances go all the way up the procedure so that the board is involved but just know that it could be by policy even if you're switching to the policy that's the way they have it as well although it's a more limited review um of the IHO independent hearing officers decision but again the ultimate decision is with the board so I talked at the outset about those pretty broad powers that you have under the statutes and it includes a lot of discretion regarding your quasi judicial roles that I described tonight. I mean, and that's really the pro in addition to hiring those quasi judicial roles of determining, you know, conducting
063hearings on employment matters, for instance, either pre- or posttermination, non-renewal, things like that. That's really an essential role that you play, although it doesn't happen, but just know that that is part of your responsibilities. And substantively, when you make those decisions, you do have a lot of discretion. Any other questions on things I covered? Nope. Not for me. Anybody else? Very good. Mar, if you want me to hang around and I can answer questions about processes, you guys I think for hiring processes, I think we had had you on deck for that as well. Okay. So, now we're on eh hiring processes for administrators and certified staff. Okay. So the reason why we're bringing this up in HR is because uh uh we do have broad authority per state statute. So we want to start
064acting inside of our authority. So we're making some adjustments so we have a little bit more uh involvement in the hiring process in the district. Um to hire or non-renew any sort of hiring or firing, we need a majority of the entire board, not a committee. So it has to be five or more. Um Diane had asked that in her email. So I just want to make that clear. Um so I just have a rough outline of some ideas. Please jump in rough outline guys. Okay. Um, so for new hires, um, for the interview process, um, I was thinking that maybe a representative could be part of the interview process for new hires for certified staff and administrators. Um, now I do not know if we want to just be an observer in that or
065if we would like to have that representative ask questions on behalf of the board. uh because there is an idea of potentially once a once the district comes with either a final the finalists for recommendation or the only recommendation, right? So they'd either have the finalist, let's say five people interviewed and there's two people up for the job, the finalists would meet with the entire board at that point. It could be like a meet and greet or it could be an actual interview process with the board. That's something that we'd need to decide as a board in what avenue, what vein we'd like that to happen. So either we'd like a board representative in the interview process to ask questions on behalf of the board during that final during the interview process with administration or
066we would just have a board individual there for observation during the administration interview and then do a board greet an interview with the recommendated recommend recommended employee. Go ahead, Craig. Uh just a couple of thoughts. um uh and and maybe a question to ask the uh or possibly even the board if it gets to that point. Um I' I'd be curious to find out what the the board might find is more advantageous. for instance, in the two particular situations where you where you're hiring um certified staff and then another situation where you're hiring uh administration like building administration, central administration, that sort of thing because I think those two two uh areas might look very different in the in the process. For instance, if uh if we were to um hire building administration and central
067administration, perhaps maybe the board would be uh more active in the the hiring committee uh situation. So that means maybe you have two boards that are sitting on uh two board representatives that are sitting on that committee and able to actively ask questions, participate. Uh then also having some of those questions pre-screened by legal to make sure that you know there's a a list of questions that you know are are uh well the for well you know if you're doing any hiring right they have to be appropriate job related questions right they have to go around your qualifications your experience your skills and abilities you know if uh you could I actually have some potential questions written down that we would ask them in the interview process like describe your educational background and goals. Um
068what are your core beliefs about how students learn best in your content area? So on and so forth. They just have to be jobreated. You know we have to stay away from any discriminatory of course questions. Um but questions can be phrased in such a way as to as to uh ascertain that particular candidates uh cultural fit with within the district. Correct. Yes. Yes, that is correct. It can be. Yes. Just a just a I guess a point of clarification. If we were to have board members sitting in on an interview process for a particular certified staff member, does it have to be the same board member consistent for the purpose of an even interview process in order to avoid any potential bias challenge later if we don't have the same board member as a
069part of all the interviews for the same candidate? I think it would be good practice to do that. Yeah. That way that person can engage one against the other. Um and otherwise you get a lot of perspectives of individuals based on various perspectives of the board member participating. Can I can I just ask for clarification? I think I missed part of your question. So uh so are you asking for like this the consistency for the entire process for that particular selection? Yeah. For hiring a science teacher at the middle school, one board member participates in all interviews for all the science teacher for that role. Gotcha. Okay. But not that they can't change and another board member does another one because depending on and Margaret I guess my question for you is on average and
070I know it might be different going into the next two years given the potential referendum situation about how many certified staff are we hiring each year so that we would know you know are we talking 20 interview processes 30 interview processes across right now this year which is a more or less a low year for us we're in the 20 to 25. Thank you. Go ahead, Carl. Yeah. I uh had had a meeting with Jared in reference to the athletic director. They're proposed a hire. Okay. And he agreed to let me sit in on that. Okay. Well, that's good. And I want to sit in on that. That's good. Uh the board needs to decide really if we want to sit in with um certified certified staff uh interviews or if we just want to
071sit in with administrative like principal and up and then I I personally would like any new employee to come and meet the board whether it's an interview process or just a meet and greet. I would like to get the culture where new employees meet the board. I think that will help foster transparency and go ahead Craig. Um you you you made a comment about principle and um um I I I think that perhaps maybe it might make more sense to to look at anybody from like a so to speak a middle management position and up. So anybody above like a a certified staff member and up. So for instance a coordinating position or uh somebody at central office that that happens to play a role um for the greater organization but doesn't particularly hold an
072official title of an administrator. Um like a dean of students might be them. Okay. I associate principal is is a an administrator but it's below the principal level. Okay. And then I kind of bouncing off of Charity's question before. If we're looking at shrinking the pool of sort of administrative roles that we're sitting in on Margaret, do you have a rough number for us about how many of those administrative roles? I think administrators we usually hire the last few years like two to four. Okay. Gotcha. And Tammy, to build on what you said about introducing folks, are you thinking like if we had were to have new certified staff, for instance, that we would we would meet them before they were on consent agenda or after? And I only asked because I each year the
073Chamber of Commerce hosts a new teacher breakfast and things like that. And would that be a good place for the board to, you know, get get all the new teachers in the district at the beginning of the school year at once? that we would participate and interact with them there. So, just curious as to what some of the thoughts were around them. Um, I'd personally like the staff, whomever the certified staff is, to come and meet the board in the board meeting. Not saying I'm opposed to anybody going to the cha chambers meet and greet the new teachers breakfast by any means, but do we really want to obligate any board members to attend that outside of their already committed to board? Okay, so Dan and then Lori, I would think we want to do
074it before the consent agenda. Okay, before the consent agenda, Lori? Yeah. And I think um if if you're going to put the time in, I think it's more important to have an individual, you know, a time where you can you can focus on individuals. It's easy in that in the breakfast situation for people to get lost in the shuffle. And I think that you would you would lose that connection with with the people you're trying to connect with. My question is then, is it an optional engagement because they are not under contract and required at that point to come and would that have any potential bearing on their employment if they choose not to? Uh, well, in my mind as I was like panning this out, it would be part of the hiring process. Like
075whomever was going to work for the district would understand that part of the hiring process would be coming and meeting the board, right? Is that uh is that something that we can do or is that outside of uh what's legally allowed for the board to I mean I I haven't seen that but there's nothing that prevents you from doing that. Well, you could do it you could do it that way or you could make it an invitation. Depends whether or not you consider it to be more of a meet and greet or more of an interview. I would think that from the way that you're talking about it and this is where I would fall as well. It would be more of an interview. Not totally formal, but it would be on the side of
076things where it's an interview. Yes. Unless we went the route where it was just going to be a meet and greet because we were going to trust the uh board members that sit on the on the interview if that happens. Do you know? We have to iron all that out essentially. Can I just clarify then that if you're interviewing every certified staff candidate, is that at the point that administration has recommended that candidate to you or is that some other point? And then are we required, Brian, to do those interviews in close session? You would do those in close session. Yeah. Okay. If they're interviews and it's not just a come meet the board, tell us a little bit about yourself, you know, welcome type of thing, then yeah, you want to do that in
077close session. Dammy, I guess I pictured it as sitting with Margaret and interviewing at one point rather than having to come back from wherever they live several times. You know, they come for one interview, there's a board member sitting there in that interview process. That's not the way you um actually I didn't know which way the board was wanting to go. So, I just prepared notes for both avenues. If if we wanted to go in the direction where we do have somebody on behalf of the board sit in on those interviews and that's what we make it as a a board, I'm totally fine with that. But if we decide as a board that um we'd rather have the individuals come and meet the board for their own interview or their own meet and greet,
078then you know there's two avenues the board can decide to take. What I'm hearing is there are two different options too. Certified are we doing certified staff? Yes or no? And are we just doing that? Yes or no? Yeah, that's one of the things that Thank you, Chair. That's one of the things I wanted to clarify, too. Um because I I totally agree with um and support the idea of having like those deemed as administrative type interviews uh coming to the board level um and having you have a close session where you can ask questions and um do that. that that's reasonable because again we're talking you know less than 10 individuals in any given year for sure right that that would be that um considered that if we're talking every certified candidate meeting every
079teacher uh we're going to have to figure out how we can uh stack in some more board meetings because I'm just thinking about the timeline for that process uh to go through the interviews right then bring them all to a board meeting um And this time of year, you may have 10 of those for lined up for one board meeting. Uh, and you know, depending on how many questions you want to ask, uh, and what that looks like, that may be quite a bit. Well, and based on the process that we had at the last board meeting where we were talking about about process and were challenged by the fact that two candidates hadn't come forward for the administrator position if we have to interview two in individual close sessions for each of the certified
080teachers. I think it probably could get overwhelming and I I could be wrong. No, I agree. I agree. That's why I'm just tossing this about and see how everybody feels about it. Craig, I'm in general support of uh you know some a little bit more of an informal setting I suppose for like certified staff if that's if if that's the way that the committee wants to go. Um I think it's more critical um or or like those uh certified staff and up positions to have something a little bit more uh more formal more more put together as far as that process is concerned. I think that uh I think that there's a lot going into certified staff and I I'm not dissatisfied with the with our certified staff. I think our certified staff and the
081process that we've had set forth, uh, we do have a very strong and robust good staff working for us. But, um, I I can understand if, uh, we want to try to, uh, improve upon that process. So, it sounds like everybody's agreed that we should should have an interview process for administrators, new administrators. Yes, I think VP and up is what we're go anything above a certified staff level. Is everybody I'm comfortable with that. Would we include the dean of students with that? Yes, the dean of students does include with that. Dan, how do you feel about that? Yeah, that's right. Anybody not in the committee have any? I I think that would be great. I think that it would be good to also leave the door open for for a board member to sit
082in on the earlier interview processes uh both for certified staff and for uh and for administration. Administrative option as an option. Yeah. They so desire, right? Well, how would that work? Um yeah, with notice obviously, right? Not just we have to have an understanding that we're just not going to show up interview day like we're sitting in today. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think it to me it has to be again that one person through that same process that's a representative so that we don't have all of a sudden five board members want to show up at one interview and then we're outnumbering the interview panel as it relates to having the conversation with the employee because as an employee I mean I think if if we had potentially nine board members all want to participate
083in all of the interviews um it it may be a bit overwhelming for the candidates. I don't think we'll we'll have that problem. I think but can we somehow word it so it's like you know if you if you think if you're an interested person and you want to do this for this one position um how do you word it that you know in in the on the outside chance that we all stampede in there right um how how do you rein that back wording wise I I'm in general support of what charity is mentioning for the for the um for the purpose of having to have a more u succinct process in place, something that that that is a little bit more I don't know structured. Well, and I was thinking, you know, is
084is it that we look to our HR committee leader and Tammy and and then Margaret to say, all right, these are the interview processes that we have forthcoming. These are the open positions that are available and these these are the interview times. Is there a particular board member that would like to participate in this role and in this role? And that way we have, for lack of a better word, a sign up process that if somebody feels really compelled to participate in that process, then we know who's going to be there, who is going to be able to come back to committee and share with us, you know, perhaps their thoughts, key takeaways, and things like that. I like that idea. That's a good idea. Um, but we I guess we'd have to be understanding
085that if we go sit in a certified not not above certified but at a certified level that we're not asking questions at that point. Correct. We're just it's just an observation, right? So we're all on the same page there. Okay. So So you're saying that when Margaret's interviewing certified staff, we'd just be observing. So, can I explain the like currently what happens is that um my office posts the job and works with the building administrator on what their plans are and I will say a lot of this is fairly standardized at this point and then um the the building administrator provides a set of questions that will standardized questions that are jobreated that are to be used by the interview panel. The building administrator then usually works with like building leadership team members or other
086interested certified staff that sit on an interview panel at the at the um at the building level to conduct the interview. And there again it goes back to what Charity was saying about consistent use of the same panel that are then evaluating the candidates and then they make a recommendation. I t talk about their recommendation with the building administrators, collect all of their supporting documentation, go through their question, their process, their references, their background, their transcript, their lensure, and then we extend a ten tentative offer for certified staff. So, I do not participate in every single interview that goes on. And I mean, that would be a huge especially this time of year when you see how many people we have on the consent agenda, which by the way, we have been very successful this
087year in filling our positions rather quickly. So, that was a win for us overall as a district, but that is our process usually for our certified staff. I will say that the process for um like those dean and above positions, coordinator positions has varied depending on the individual position. And there certainly has been time in the past where we have had board members that have been interested in sitting on and being active participants in selecting the candidate to be re um referred to the board or recommended to the board. And that actually has served the district well when that happened because then the board knows that there was a representative with their the board's interest on the panel. Um staff know that there was board interest in those positions and that it was a rather
088robust interview panel that uh participated in recommending that hire to the to the board. So I mean I think most of us would say that you know if somebody is willing to commit to that process we welcome their participation on interview panels and we do do some of the things that you have been recommending in terms of standardized you know questions so that there's consistency and questions that are asked according to good practice and that are are legally defensible and help us to get the best person for the job in this particular district in that particular building. So, okay. I I would second I would echo Margaret's um uh I guess uh statement about what's going on, what has happened in the past. uh and I know that I as a board member got a
089chance to sit up sit on on uh one of such interviews uh that that process and I appreciated that. I would suggest that if if there's a particular u area of that that particular um administrator is going to serve in the district. for instance, uh like it was HR or I'm I'm sorry, not HR. Uh I don't want to pick pick on you, Margaret. Thank you. No. Um if it was a particular position like um oh a a curriculum uh coordinator or something of that nature perhaps maybe maybe then you'd ask somebody from ed services uh as a committee member to sit on that committee. If it's somebody in the financial area of the district, you might want to ask somebody from the fiscal committee to sit on that, you know, as as much as
090feasibly possible. Mhm. I think what might work from a process standpoint and speaking most from at from the administrator hiring perspective is that you know we bring forward uh a recruitment plan and I it's really up to you Craig and Tammy how to decide do you want that to go to board leadership do you want it to go through um HR but that a a plan of um what happens after we've collected Ed in applicants then you know what are the questions what are what is the scheduling and the timeline for pulling in candidates I mean with administrators it's often we have two rounds of can of candidates we have an initial pool and there again there have been you know rather large panels of people participating in that and have the opportunity to meet
091those candidates to help pick the best person and then that gets narrowed to a a smaller pool of finalists which then are brought back in for interviews um and and final selection for recommendation to the board. So I don't know what process you want in terms of how the recruitment plan should flow to you Tammy or if it should flow to the board leadership. I I don't know. But I mean that is something certainly that is doable from our perspective when we have administrator vacancies or those other key support roles u that are beyond the classroom or student services areas. Absolutely. So how many people are typically on a panel? Um, it depends on the on the position and and it depends on, you know, the level of interest among staff, but we do usually
092have staff that sit in on administrator interviews and are allowed to provide input to the hiring authority. Um, we are always very clear with certified staff that they're providing, you know, in input for a recommendation that it's not like a popular vote or anything like that in terms of of final decision. But we've had 10 12 people involved in interview panel. Sometimes when couple years when we were trying to fill shurers a few years back we had practically the whole staff that wanted to participate and they had got a chance to meet the the candidates and and things like that. So I mean our interview process we try to make open enough that various stakeholders have the opportunity to provide input. Jared's I mean that's Jared has led that type of process. I don't know
093Jared if you have anything else you wanted to say about the process at all. No. And again, I'm I'm here, you know, trying to seek some clarity to figure out I love that the board wants to have some some more involvement and come alongside administration, especially on like the really important hires of other administrators uh and those who do administrative type duties. In that regard, um I I would struggle a lot with trying to figure out how we would have a process that doesn't um jam up our processes and timelines for hiring people uh if the board were wanting to try to get involved in every hire of a certified teacher. Um because I I'm not saying it can't be done. I just I'm I'm struggling with what would that look like? Um to have
094a meaningful connection and a timeline that won't have us lose candidates uh because other offers may come to them or whatever else. And we want to try to secure those offers um as soon as we can and as soon as possible and then get them already into the culture of being part of our staff and and move that forward to retain that hire. So, I I'm all ears to hear uh how the board wants to come along and and and be part of that process. I love the idea of uh you know, some a board member or two sitting in on the interview team. Um you know, I I I'm glad that they have um the interest in doing that. Uh and would love to be part of that team. Um because it does help
095just like uh when we started having uh board members in on the the curriculum review process just hearing from another board member, you know, at least one other board member who's your peer to say here's how the process went because you guys don't speak in education speak like we do and you don't, you know, talk like that. And so the ability for you to uh transition that discussion into a meaningful board discussion is a lot different than administration um trying to talk you through that whole process. So that's all I really have to add. I'm just curious as to you know what level of coming alongside uh do you want to do and and how can we help incorporate you into that process. So right now Yeah. Go ahead. Um, yeah, one final thought, and
096I think this goes along with what Jared just said. I think a I think a good middle ground uh for involvement would be that all resumeumés for, you know, open position applications uh would be made available to the board in general uh whenever they're submitted. I think that would be helpful. That way you kind of get some insight into who's in the running. And um I think that could simplify and streamline the manner in which the board is involved in that hiring process. So to clarify uh Sam, would that be like uh all of the candidate like teacher candidates who maybe were uh the finalists for the position, you know, once we narrowed it down to the top three or whatever were in the final round interview. Might be three, might be eight. Um you
097know, depending on how good our pool is. Um because if you're asking for all of them, um sometimes, you know, we can get 20 some applicants just for one position. Uh you multiply that by, you know, 20 30 positions. That's a it's a lot of uh detail um that you guys hire us to go through and and deal with. I'm just wondering what level of support you want to help us with there. Yeah, definitely. So, um refresh me on exactly what the hiring process is. My memory is that you initially uh have a pool of applicants. They apply. You have a very brief initial interview process and then that goes to the second stage interview process. Is that correct? No. We first do um we collect the applicants, we review their qualifications, and then at
098the administrator level, we screen those applicants to rule out those candidates that do not um meet the minimum qualifications or if it's a really large group of candidates, we will screen out those people who based on experience level and what our hiring needs are. So then that reduces the candidate pool to a manageable group to interview. We don't interview every single person that applies and then that group is identified for interview and those qualifications are shared with the interview panel. Um it like in making applications available to interview panels, we always do like a briefing on the need for confidentiality and the need not to to um you know do their own reference checking and things like that. I don't know Brian if you you are probably more articulate about the confidentiality requirements associated with
099handling an applicant pool. So I don't know if you have anything else you wanted to add. I just it's an important component. So I mean and it's true not just of those types of documents but any documents that board members receive um just because it might be public record although references aren't that wouldn't be subject to open public records request but just being conscious of the confidentiality of that and the control of the information flow. So making sure that things don't get forwarded to others and that type of thing. But yeah, I think or that we unknowingly disclose to a current employer that somebody is looking for a job and they haven't told their current employer. And yeah, I think as long as it's passive and there's some confidentiality protections, some guard rails there, I
100don't have an issue with um with those being shared amongst the board. Yeah. And so responsible. And so my thought was that after that initial uh wave of screening though then the remaining applicant resumes applications would be would be made available to the board. This is Brad Clark. I'm on the call. I'm wondering if you'd want to hear from um an admin perspective on how we go through the process. I've obviously gone through it many times the hiring process. So, if you have any questions or if you want me to talk through what happens after Margaret turns it over to us, I'd gladly fill you in. Or if you have any questions about that process, I'm on the I'm on the call. So, if I can help at all, let me know. Yeah, let's hear
101Brad. Oh, I'm not sure who that was. Tammy. That was Tammy. Oh, Tammy. Okay. So just just so you know when we get when we get an open position we go through we can which is the state you know setup where they can apply we review all of their documents which are many there's personal statements there's um resumeumés there's letters of reference there and sometimes we get I'd say on average right now we're getting about 12 to 15 applicants for certified staff positions. We review those. We set up a team. Like, for example, if it's going to be a third grade teacher, those other third grade teachers want to be involved because it's going to fit in with their team. Um, other teachers like to be involved that way. So, we screen the applicants. We
102come up with professional questions. We run them by Margaret and then we invite them in. And currently we try to do that process fast because they drop quickly. For example, we'll screen and decide, well, we'd like to interview maybe six. We have six really good candidates. We want to interview. We'll probably lose two of those six because it's so competitive before we even get to that interview process in as short of time as three to four days. So, right now, I'm trying to set them up. Maybe I called this position I'm working on right now. I called candidates on Thursday for Tuesday to try to get as many available in as I could and build our team so we can interview quickly. Then we go through, we meet, we review, we go through the applicants
103together as a team. They all present to me typically their their rankings of um abilities and who they believe they will take. I take that information and then I make reference checks. Again, I try to do that the same day because if I don't, I'm going to lose them again if it takes me a week to do reference checks. So, I try to do that the same day or the next day. And then I turn that information all over to Margaret. Margaret and I discuss who we could make an offer to, then I'll reach out and let that person know as soon as Mar says says, "Okay, your proess is good. This seems like a good candidate." I want to call them right away and say, "Hey, you're our person. Please hang on for an
104offer and and ultimate board approval. Like, just know that we want you. You're the best teacher available to us right now, but there's still a process to go through. So, it it does take time and it's it's it's a lot. So, I don't know if you have any questions about that process along the way and what that looks like. and I gladly help. Questions? Anybody? Yeah. Uh Brad, do you see us possibly getting in the way of your timeline? You know, if we had a good a good process for that and I knew who to bring in and between that Tuesday to Thursday, I could say, "Hey, here's here's our interview. you know, we're interviewing Tuesday and now we're going to interview from till 1:30 because I do have six candidates coming in this week.
105You know, that's a pretty pretty big commitment. Um, and and bring in other teaching staff and other people. So, if we had a good process for that and we can reach out and make it happen quick, I I Well, Brad, you're kind of breaking up a little key right now. Can you hear us, Brad? Because you're kind of breaking up. Okay. Yes, I can hear you. Okay, stay wherever you are right now because we can hear you. Okay. I said if we had a good process for that, it would be okay, I think, because we have to get them in quick. So would it be reasonable to ask you to to email the chair of the HR committee just for a notice for what you just said that you know you're you're going to be
106interviewing candidates on this date between these times and and and that way it's kind of like uh you know jumping on a moving train. uh the uh the chair would then uh let people know who are interested um if they wanted to participate. Would that be reasonable and streamlined? I personally think we should rope Lynn in right because Lynn usually does all the coordinating. I guess I am not so much concerned with the certified staff because my understanding with the room was that we were going to be somewhat removed from the certified staff like the ability to sit in interviews but not actively participate in interviews. Correct. Still need a process that's streamlined. Oh yes. Yes. So I I think that Lynn might be the best contact because she would be readily available during working
107hours where the committee chair in any committee, you know, might not be available during working hours to get that email out as quickly as it needs to be out to all the board members to see if, you know, Dan wants to sit in to a certified staff interview that's scheduled on Thursday of this week or something like that. That sounds like um So, can I just clarify my understanding? What you're talking about is that for every interview panel that's set up at this building level for certified staff, you want an email sent out to the board members for anyone that wants to commit to that particular interview panel through that. Right. I Yeah, I But is that the process then? you want. Lynn would then collect whatever interviews are on deck or being planned for
108a certain day and then would send an email to all of you saying, "Okay, for Tuesday, Webster is hiring a third grade teacher. This is the time and date for these interviews." And RMS is hiring a teched person and this is the time and date for those interviews. And then you as board members would then contact the building administrator to get added to the panel. Is that I think it would still all have to be coordinated through Lynn because is it a first come first serve? whomever emails Lynn first is the one that then represents is there like what's the follow- on process recognizing we won't always get a long time frame you know and and what's the point of sitting in or submitting questions when we're not going to meet until the last Monday
109of the month well I think this is moreformational for us understanding and being part of the process than than actually, you know, choosing the candidate at that level. What will we do with that information? I guess is my point. That's a great question. Um and two part of me logistic logistically says okay if you're going to observe um the temptation of administration to come to a board member that sat there in that meeting to to observe and ask them what did you think is going to be pretty great at that point just because hey well you're you're part of you're part of the process somewhat. But I mean that can be kind of confusing. Um I agree with Dan. You're not are you not going to share that information or as a board member? Are
110you the type of person that um are we expecting that board member to raise a red flag and say, "Hey, at the board uh meeting, I I would like to carve out these potential uh candidates for uh a potential upcoming closed session. I mean, what is the outcome that we're we're seeking there?" Because if if the if the outcome is that we want to make sure that we have a better say in the the um that particular process uh for certified staff then then okay I can understand that but we still have to refine that that process by which um you would reject a candidate if that were the case. I mean, because that not to say that you would reject a candidate, but like if you're going to raise a red flag to say,
111"Hey, listen, we need this process didn't go the way we wanted it to go or or whatever the case may be, I think we need to go into close session to discuss that. How what does that look like?" Well, um I'm confused on that because I me personally I think I think I'd almost rather just leave it leave the um certified staff to the uh administration because I think we're coming up the works a little bit. I think I think more importantly is is your administration that trusting your administration to um establish that particular culture in that particular building. If you have the administration that that you feel confident in, they're going to do that work and you're going to be more trusting of what they do. So I I well I think you're just
112gumming up the situation here. uh due to the fact that uh they have to know almost immediately because he's you just heard what Brad said. A lot of time they got to call him almost immediately to get them hired. Yeah, I'm get I get what you're saying, Carl. I agree with Craig. I am comfortable with just having greater oversight over administrator administrators and leaving certified staff to administration. I'm just bringing all the potential options to the board to see where everybody's temperature is at essentially. Yeah. And I I was under the impression that we were not we didn't have a will to weigh in on the certified staff uh interview process so much as it would be educational for board members. Correct. That's what I got from all of you. Yes. The only will that
113I really have is I don't want to lose the ability that should in the future during contract renewal if we have questions about certified staff, we still have the opportunity to exercise our right to say, you know, I would like to get in a closed session about the renewal of certain certified staff members, right? Like that's Yes. But not new hires, right? So, I'm okay with the board leaving that solely to administration as it comes certified staff. So, Dan, Dan, yes, I I'm with you on that. Okay. And I'm with you on that. Okay. Uh, and then as far as résumés go, would you still like to have all résumés, both certified staff and administrative rums, provided to the board? Um, yes. I think that would be a good idea. Carl, Dan, what do you
114think? Not at all. Yeah. Right. After that initial screening process is what I meant. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm not against it. I'm not really for it, but I'm not against Okay. Can you expand on why you're not for it? It's a lot of resumes. I um we've been adding a lot of responsibilities to our administrators recently. And every time you add something that means that takes away from something else that they would be doing. So I think uh if this is going to fall on Lynn's shoulders you know then we can't keep adding more responsibility onto these people. So okay there fair there Carl I agree. Yeah. So that's you know it's I don't know if I'm 6040 or 5050 but well where the any resumes yet. Okay. And we find some pretty good features
115I believe. So the committee would recommend not having the resumes sent over thing. Correct. Because we're the three committee members and two of the three think that it's not necessary. Correct. for certified staff. Yes. Margaret, you with us? Yep. So, just to clarify, but you would like that once of initial screening, you would like it for the admin. Oh, definitely. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So, certified staff, we're going to move away from that and we're going to go to just admin. admin hiring, admin renewals. That's what we'll go to. Okay. So, my brief notes. Okay. So, when we're hiring admins, um, we agree that we want a board member in the interview process. Correct. Actively engaged in the interview process, guys. Yes. Yeah. Go ahead. I'm sorry. I actually have a question here because I
116was looking in and administrative guideline 312A is selection of professional personnel and one of the things it has in it is a procedure for principal positions which we could potentially look to modify and it says if there's an opening a screening committee consisting of blank board members, blank members of professional staff, blank students and blank parents shall be selected to participate in the interview process. So are we looking to expand it to that extent? Are we looking to use some of the existing administrative guidelines to provide some definition as to what that administrator interview process could be? Because there's also pre-employment interview questions that are administrative guideline 3120C. So again, some of those things that you were talking about how you had some sample interview questions and things like that from a pre-screen standpoint, you
117know, maybe those are things that we can use as part of the evaluation process, but not sure where we're at with the administrative guidelines for Niola. So yeah, I was just going to clarify those are the NEOLA ones, right? Correct. Yeah. Yes. And so if those if I don't know, you know, have we have we moved to adopt any of those? And if not, you know, they might not be something that we could use or address right now, but might be just goodformational material to look at as we're talking about process. So, just for clarification, uh we have not worked on um many of the administrative guidelines. We've worked on mostly policy. There were a couple of administrative guidelines that we knew we had to implement um right away with the policies. The ones that
118we knew were going to be accompanying policies, maybe help add more support or layers kind of like the ones you're talking about there, charity, we haven't addressed yet. We plan to address those as a committee between now and December, at least on our timeline. Thanks for the clarification. Yep. Go ahead. Jar Jared had the best. Oh, okay. Clarify. No question then. No. Okay. All right. So, um, we're going to be actively engaged in the final interviews, right? Or in the in the interview process. And then I was thinking that the whole board would interview the administrators. We'd have a close session interview process for middle level management in the district. Hammy, are you envisioning all candidates or a select number? Like whomever the finalists are, not like the first stage, but just the finalists. Wanted
119to be sure. Thank you. Um and then um when when they're starting in their administrative role, they will start with the one-year contract, like a probationary period, and after that, we will move to two-year contracts if they fall outside of that promotion probationary period. Um is that part of statute that yeah that you were talking about before? Well, one or two years. You can't do more than two years. Although you can do multiple one-year extensions. So yes, one year at the initial for the initial contract would be permissible. Okay. But for I I guess I' I'd defer to Margaret on this and Jared. In your experience, are candidates more likely to be interested in a position with a one-year contract or less likely to be interested in that type of a position? You know, I
120would hold that, you know, on average, most school districts do offer a two-year. There are districts out there who have a one-year. Um, and when we've chosen to do that, right, it's it's met a specific need. Um, sometimes we even say like a one-year interim position. We did that um at Shur uh prior to this last year um because of the hiring window and how late the hiring window was. Um and we wanted to make sure that we had a really robust candidate pool. Uh so we offered just an interim contract. you know, it was a one-year contract, but we also not only stipulated one year, but we we laid another layer of stipulation on top of that that was, you know, to let people know this is only an interim. Like you you you
121may be considered, but you have to enter the employment pool again, right? And be an applicant all over. It it is sometimes a point of negotiations when we extend an offer too where somebody will say I'd love to come there but I'm only coming on a two-year and you know in certain positions people have the latitude to negotiate at that level and then the decision would be do we want that candidate badly enough to go ahead with the two-year. Let's just say we come across a rockstar administrator and we want to make sure that, you know, um they they are committed to our district and we're committed to them for a period of time, but yet we realize that, you know, things for the first year aren't going to exactly be perfect in that building.
122There's going to be some disruption when it comes to the changes that have to take place. I I feel like maybe um a two-year contract is is is appropriate for that type of a situation. However, I can I could see that maybe if if the board is comfortable with a one-year contract for uh administration starting out to make it a one-year renewing contract and then uh I don't know administration is not a renewing contract. Is that 1824? Okay. on renewal provisions. So, right, so at least they have that protection in place that hey, at the end of one year, there's a strong likelihood that the district's going to move forward and renew my contract. I'm okay with that uh a renewal one year, but I I do like the probationary period, especially if you're new
123to the district because if you are not a fit for the district, then we both need to wait out the two-year contract. I would hesitate the use of probationary only because it automatically would put me as a candidate on my heels that you're expecting me to do something wrong. I don't know. I've never had an employeement that I did not have a long probationary period like 18 months and they make it very clear to you you're in probationary employment right now. Same here everywhere. Can can Mr. Mr. Waterman, can we ask you to just kind of talk over the the difference in administrative contracts, uh, one year versus a two-year versus a versus a rolling kind of contract, and what those mean and what they look like and the management points that the board has
124and administration has in between uh, those periods to make sure that we have uh, control over the issues that we might need to. Yeah, I mean, different districts do it differently. I will say that you typically see two-year contracts. That's the norm. There's nothing prevents you from doing a one year. I often see one year is when um it comes renewal time and you're unsure if you want to keep someone around. Um sometimes you'll do a one year um to see, you know, so you're not locking yourself in. Sometimes there's separate extensions uh extension provisions that are purely contractual, not statutory, in which uh I'm not a big fan of these. they have really long lead times, but essentially you have to give notice very early or it's going to continue to roll over for
125another two years each year. So that's something that you should be aware of too is that some of those and I think Jared that might be what you're talking about when you talk about rolling because all of them are subject to non-renewal and those procedures, but some administrator contracts and I don't know if your standard contract does, but some have them where they roll over and renew prematurely. You don't. That's good. No, we don't. And and and we don't have u you know uh a one-year or a two-year uh renewal. Um what we do is uh in December, right? Uh in general, we say here's everybody who is at the end of their two-year, we also want to make you aware that um these are the people who are in midyear or in the middle
126of their contract. And should you think it's important or if you think they're doing a good job and you want to give them another year, you can you can give them a year extension, you know, essentially giving them a two-year when they still had a year left on that contract. Um, we've most recently did that this year um because uh as an administrative uh committee, we wanted to talk a little bit about um what those contracts uh look like. Um and there's a stipulation that we need to go over, but that's more for a close session discussion. Do you have discretion as long as you're not going over the two-year mark? Okay. Feelings on that, Cary? Dan? Well, if most districts are giving them a two-year contract, that I would think that's more attractive than
127us giving them a one. And if we want that rockstar that Craig's talking about, we want to be competitive with those other districts. and two years like Craig also said that first year may be getting the teachers on board in that in that school you know and it may not look like it's going to look after that so I think the two-year is more appropriate Carl I don't think there's any rock stars so one or two I gotta agree with Dan I think your reasoning's good. Anybody else would like to add anything? What do you think, Tammy? Um, I think that if we're going in the direction where we want to improve everything in this district and poor performance and everything that it would be better suited for the district to do a one-year contract
128because if you get a poor fit, they can be exited more quickly and a better fit potentially hired into the district is my personal opinion. It's also fiscally responsible to do that, I would say. Can I can I just say one? Yes, please go right ahead. Um, when we think about the non-renewal period, so if you're if you got a contract and you're operating it July 1 to June 30th, the non-renewal requires you to make those decisions in January. So, the only one one of the issues I see with an initial one-year period because it's not truly a one-year probation period. It's really you're going to you're going to evaluate their performance from the start of school until about December when you have to decide whether or not you're going to move forward with the
129non-renewal process. So, just something to think about. Okay, that is Thank you for bringing that total of about four months. Yeah, that's not much. That makes the two-year look a whole lot better. Yeah, it does Sam. Yeah, charity. Yeah, thanks for that. Okay. All right. So, then we'll go to the two-year. This is for new hires. So then, um, since we're kind of handsoff with certified staff, I I like I said, Margaret, I would still like to exercise the right that if a board member does have an issue with anybody on the consent agenda, they can request a closed meeting to have that discussed. Um, when it comes to uh contract renewal renewals for administration, I was thinking that we would set up close sessions with Jared to discuss the performance um and potential growth
130of those administrators in the district. So he would discuss with us what he is seeing in his administrators. Um and um anybody's thoughts on that for that against that? Did we hire Jared for that reason? Well, yes, but we need to renew their contract. So Jared would have a closed meeting with us and discuss with us like you know why he's making the recommendation for the renewal, the strengths that he's seeing in that administrator, the the potential growth that he might see from that individual moving elsewhere in the district. Um and when when did you think uh well it would need to be before the contract renewal, right? So every other January or December, do you think it? I was just going to say t t t t t t t t t t t
131t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t typically um we have done this in um you know more of the December time frame. um you know if there were there were large concerns or or or some things that we needed to talk about uh we would share those uh in close session uh at uh HR committee meeting and then again with the full board at the full board meeting um as as we would review those and then your job is to make a decision. Um, I usually give you the option around December uh to decide whether or not we want to do those renewals. Um, statute says we have to have them done in
132January, but I like to give you guys a long enough runway to have more than one conversation uh where I'm coming in hot with some information and you guys have to make a decision tonight or at least uh in the next week or two uh you schedule a special meeting. So, we like to really try to head those up in December. um give you some discussion points uh talk about where people are at and then have some time for you to ask me questions and maybe even bring back more data and then in January if we need to finish those like perfect um I think uh I guess I would ask for some clarification behind that a little bit because um I don't know I didn't live in this house before you bought you might
133not be aware of like how that has typically played out in the past being new on this particular board. Yeah. But in the past those conversations have um sometimes uh been a you know this is a no news is good news type of situation. Um are you requesting that perhaps maybe Jared come to the board with more of um like a performance report? Yes. To the board at that time. Yes. Okay. I'd be on I'd be on board with Carl. Dan, say it again. Where am I? Um like when the contracts come up for administrators, Jared and the board will have a closed session to discuss performance of those administrators as their contracts are coming to be renewed. I agree with that. Anybody else? Anybody? Charity, Lori, Sam in good to me. Sounds good. Will
134it be the same level that we were talking about being involved with the plan through the interview panel? So that same level of administrator and not um yeah, I believe so. Okay. Yeah. Not certified like so just just a Yeah, just a clarification. And I think Margaret's thinking the same way. Technically, as far as state statute is concerned, anybody that's a building administrator on up would be considered for non-renewal in like January. Okay. Like a Dina students and a uh coordinator is falls under the general category of a certified staff member for the sake of the statute. So then we would be revisiting those particular individuals in September I believe. Okay. Oh no, not September. Non-renewal for April. Right. Yeah. Has to be done by April. April. Just as a point of clarification. Okay. So
135we'd have two separate meetings then is what you're saying kind of like just the way it would work out which is fine. You'd have a December meeting and then an April meeting or a March. Correct. Gotcha. Okay. So, um, since we've went through all of this, does anybody have any questions, concerns about us engaging in the process? Well, Sam did bring up that that point about resumes and and we did shut that down, but there there could be could we have an option if we wanted to look at certain resumes? I mean, can we do that now? Would we I I mean, I'm all available. I'm not opposed to that, but I think consistency is key, right? Like if we allow us to willy-nilly ask for resumes whenever we want, that does not allow Lynn,
136if she's the person tasked with getting that information to us, a consistent workflow, right? Then Lori can ping her asking for a resume, I can ping her asking for a resume where if we decide as a board, we would like to see resumes of finalists going forward, at least knows that's part of her peer review now, not waiting for charity to call and ask for a resume or Craig to call and ask. I think that would hinder Lynn more than help Lynn by making it a selective kind of thing. It would actually be less work to just have Lynn or to have Margaret make a repository where the resumes are available for viewing. That would be a lot simpler. Yeah, like a Google Drive. Exactly. Or maybe something a little bit more secure. But yeah,
137something equivalent to that. Yeah. What do you think, Carl? I mean, I really don't want to see them. Well, I mean, you wouldn't have to look at them. It wouldn't be requiring that, but having them available. I mean, what if you Yes, I understand that. I completely understand that. Better than you. I am for having the resumes available. I I'm for that. If if this to the Now, Sam, the plan was like once the 30 people apply first round, we're moving forward with eight. You want to see those eight resumes? Yeah. Not the not the whole swap. Yeah. No, my question is do you Now, this is just me kind of playing devil's advocate. Would it be best to just see the finalists? Do you have two interviews, Margaret, for certified staff like teachers and
138stuff or is it just the initial eight and you move forward? It really is dependent on the on the pool. I think anyone who's not like if we have eight people that come in and there's two really great candidates, it it might be that we pull those two really great candidates in for a second round. Okay. In other situations like what Brad was talking about where you only have three or four candidates, then they're not going to pull in for a second round. They might do like observation days which are kind of courtesy visits or whatever but but not not used as part of the decision making. It's more like to persuade the candidate this is a great place to work. We want you to see what we're all about and things like that. Okay.
139But it really does depend on like candidate availability and the quality of the candidates that come through. Okay. So, do we want like the wording to be like finalists? I would say after the initial after initial screening resumes remaining after initial candidates selected for interview. Okay. So we're going back now and and getting resumes now for certified staff because I know we had talked about no for certified staff, yes for admin, but it's sounding like we might be revisiting the certified staff. And if so, my question would be how do we feel that this will help us as we approach consent agendas if we have no other interview materials available to us and only resumes? Do we have no other interview materials provided by HR with for the consent agenda? Not typically. No. So we're
140just consenting on a bunch of names and we don't really essential of the administration. That doesn't that's not very comfortable. I mean if we have to consent we should have some knowledge of what's going on. I think a resume is a good start for that. I just the reason that I wouldn't have because I feel the same way Lori. The reason I wouldn't have proposed initially that we have additional data from the interview process is because I don't know what it looks like to effectively compile and make easily accessible that interview data. If there is a way to do that simply, I would certainly be for that. Uh I just don't know and I think the resume is the next best option. And so that's that's what my thought was. And again, what are we
141going to do with the information that we get from the resumes? Well, I think you can learn a lot from a resume. I know, but what what would we do? Oh, but well, the the point was you're asking they're asking us to consent, right, to the hiring of these people? I'd like to know who they are. Can can you know why are why are we consenting if we know nothing besides their name? No, I understand that. I just looking at the timing of the hirate, you know, that's well I could see I could see some potential value and also knowing u how many candidates apply for the position and because because if if for instance you get down to like there's only three candidates too for that position does the board then make a decision
142to to say hey listen uh I'm not sure that we got the, you know, the best qualified candidate. I mean, all that that's out there. We just we just want to extend our uh uh employment opportunity for a longer period of time um till we can get that. But I I don't know. That's why having all of the immediate information, I mean, even before screening, I mean, depending on how hard it is to compile that information. I wouldn't think that it would be that hard. I think that that's the better route because the more information you have, the less time you have to spend in a meeting asking Margaret, hey, can you remember this thing that happened 3 weeks ago and like tell me all about this? And that's not really fair to Margaret and
143it's not fair to the people who are sitting in the meeting or watching the meeting. People don't necessarily want meetings to go on for five hours. If there if it's content heavy, if it's substantial, a meeting can go on as long as it needs to, but if a lot of it is rehashing just data acquisition, that's best done ahead of time before the meeting even gets started. So that's my thought on resumeumés and things like that. I appreciate it. Um, so can I ask what the expectation would be for the administrators to be prepared to answer questions about those candidates because I mean we go through interview panels and there's candidates that we remove from consideration. We deal with the ones that are selected for interview and are you then expecting to be able to
144engage the building administrators in conversations related to like who they selected for the interview as opposed to hey why didn't you take this person that inter was what I I because that we we would as a cabinet need to process I would potentially um envision what what Sam's probably asking for as not only maybe a resume, but just a a brief summary on on why they felt that this is a good recommendation. You know, I don't know if that would suffice. Yeah, I think that I I mean I think that that would be worthwhile. Again, we always want to balance how much work we're giving to administration because there's certainly a lot of work as is. I do like that idea a lot. Um but I think that you know when we make a decision
145about something we should be able to give an answer as to why we made that decision. And so in that regard you know at any point we could say I want to pull this person or this role from the consent agenda and I want to have a closed meeting discussion about that. That's within that's within the boundaries of how we currently operate. So from that perspective, I mean there's always a chance even as we stand right now that an administrator might be asked to come in and talk to us about that about that role. So um I I would hope that we don't do that very often and that things move smoothly, but I think that providing that information is going to help streamline that process. Um, so I mean keeping in mind like this
146is what I thought, you know, if I were the administrator thinking being able to articulate this is why I thought this was the best pick for position. Well, at the very very least, um, it checks the verification box, right? As as far as a board member is concerned, you want to verify that the staff has engaged in a process that you feel comfortable with. Craig, we have seven of the eight members here. So if this were to go to the full board, you know what I mean? It's like we could decide now. Well, how we feel about that? You probably want to have the committee make a recommendation to the board if one way or but I mean we could kind of give the leading how the board would vote. I I think you would
147have to go into a committee of the whole to do that. It's not a or is that something more? It's not a board meeting. It's a committee meeting. I I understand that would be stepping outside of board policy and maybe outside of statute. We it is specifically indicated in our board policy that the that a committee will not be making um those kind of board level decisions. uh specifically by the nature of the conversation that exists by by a board member being able to participate in in the committee. Okay. Well then, Carl, I am kind of leaning towards let's uh do what was recommended in getting those resumes. So, I'm changing side with Danny. So, you're the odd man out. Sorry. He wants the resumes. Let him in. Okay. Okay. So, we've moved to resumes
148for certified staff and above. Right. And then we are going to be more actively involved with administration. I'm sorry. I'm just recapping, guys. Okay. Um we're going to be more actively involved with um middle level management in the district. Um we will have somebody actively participate in the interview process. Um and then the administrator will come to the board for a board level interview close session interview. Anybody questions, concerns, opposition to that? Please share. No, I think just just point of clarification. Who would who would be leading and running the interview process for close session meetings? Is it you? Is it you in conjunction with Margaret? Is it Craig as board president? Is it Jared as superintendent? So, so just so that we know we go to each of those closed sessions, you know, who
149will that interview? I think it would be best, my recommendation would be Craig, the president should be potentially running those um if it's a if it's at the full board meeting. Yes. And I think that's what your recommendation was. Yes. Yes, I would recommend that, Craig. Even if it was a committee meeting, I feel like it would be best that you run it because you to you are to represent the whole board, right? So, um not not in a committee meeting. Well, but if we went into a close session, right, and we made the decision that because it was going to be an interview of potential staff, we were going to have the board president as the facilitator of those questions or of that meeting. Okay. For that specific reason. then uh at a board
150meeting that might have to be that might be a separately um a separately agenda meeting then okay it would have to be I was going to say that the point of clarification I was going to ask is you know I I know that we are only doing this for those uh mid-level managers right um so that's principles assistant principles coordinators right um directors as well. Am I hearing correct? Yes. Okay. Um even though those happen um not as frequently like I said less than uh probably about a handful a year, maybe more than that on a on a untypical year. We still need to have a a fairly quick turnaround. We can't wait two or three weeks to the next board meeting to finish our hiring process. you know, from start to end, we want
151to make sure that we continue that process going. So, we're going to have to make sure that we have some flexibility within the board to have special board meetings when it comes to interviewing those people, right? And I'll have to work with, you know, the board president, Lynn, to set a special meeting, right? will agenda it for um making sure that we finalize the interview process much like you would um Craig when you did the interviews for my position as superintendent, right? Uh and um that we have that completed that way and we will just have to go with as many board members as we can get there to do the final interview process for interviewing. Okay. I mean, and that brings me back to the question that or the the policy that Craig read
152before talking about if the superintendent determines there's an urgent need to fill a position or that another exceptional good cause exists that the standard practices can be modified in order to get those potential candidates in. And I'm thinking about for instance, we know that we have multiple administrator positions open at the high school and a very important time for the administrators to be in place. So thinking about having those special meetings to ensure that we're getting those folks into the positions. Okay. Um we decide on the two-year contract because of the explanation, which I appreciate you giving that. Um, other than that, other than um for contract renewals for administrators, us having that session with Jared to go over the performance of um the administrators that we are tasked with renewing. Does anybody have anything
153they'd like to add to the process? Take away from the process, questions, concerns, improvements, anything at all? No. you had a lot of amount of already. I mean like you had anticipated my Yeah. My comment was would be I appreciate I appreciate the preparation on on that. I Oh yeah. Thank you. least I can do. Anybody? Okay. So I think that's the end of this discussion. Margaret, do you want to go over the notes that you have there for the minutes just to make sure that we're on the same page? So, I mean the minutes or for like the minutes will be a little bit long. Oh, yeah. Summarize my understanding of where the discussion landed. One is that resumes for certified staff invited to interview will be made available to all board members. Um
154we will anybody involving hiring related to a coordinator or above position the board will have an active uh in involvement and role in that. The um candidates selected as finalists will come back to the board for an interview via special board meeting most likely and that we're implementing generally speaking two-year contracts for admin renewals. Our admin renewals are subject to a close session discussion with Jared and the board to support the renewal. Okay. Yeah, we're good, guys. Okay. So, now um we need to go into Do we have to It's contemplated close session, so we don't need to go into that, right, Margaret? We are going Oh, we are going into close session. Okay. for we go consent agenda, go back to A and B. We never want consent agenda on um yeah, if everybody's
155comfortable with doing that, moving back to A and B for the consent agenda and uh make a recommendation to move it for to the board meeting for approval. I need you guys to like Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. Yes. All right. Yes. Would be understanding that here on forward that pro that because because understand that the consent agenda that is tonight didn't fall follow fall follow line with your your new requirecess your new process which will be approved potentially at the end of this month. Correct. Yeah. Then I think they both go to close session. That's correct. Okay. So guys, um I I'll first close session. So what you would do is you would um uh entertain a motion to enter into close session. Okay. I know we go into close session. Second. Okay. And that's
156at 7:48. And then you would take a roll call vote of your committee members. Oh, sorry guys. All right. Carl, yes. Dan, yes. Tammy, yes. Very important, sir. And the motion carries. We're now into close session. And before we start any other discussion, you're going to want allow for Margaret to stop. I'm just going to run to remove certain individuals out of the I need I'm gonna Hey, I want to thank Brian. Brian, thanks for coming tonight. I think we're at the end of our need and I really appreciate you showing up. Yeah. Thank you. Have a good evening. Thanks for all your time, man. I really appreciate it. You bet. Go ahead. All right. So, um No, I'm not. Okay. Okay. The next meeting date is Monday, July 21st, 2025. Action items. Yes, I'm
157sorry. Action items. So I I have for action items uh one uh we I'll be setting up USI meeting in August with the various options for plan renewal. Um I will do a summary of the actions from our discussion regarding the hiring processes as I had summarized earlier. I will follow up with Jared regarding the um the personnel matter we discussed and then Jared and I will also be following up regarding um the other close session item with respect to contracts. Okay. And then on the future meeting planning future meeting planning there are two documents. One is the 2425 cycle which we just completed. Um, and then there's a draft of 2526. And yes, I noticed that I need to correct the top of the year, but it will start with July 25 and it'll
158go through June of 2026 along with some various and sunundry topics that have come up in HR committee meetings in the past. This is a fluid and working document and I would expect by the time that we get done in June next year, we will have numerous other topics that will be built into this. And I um typically how I've worked with this document is that the chair of the committee gets uh suggestions or recommendations from committee and or other board members in terms of topics to discuss and then I just add them in or and then you can just let me know what to add in or sometimes we will have something the administration will have something that we want to plug in for a certain month and then I will let you know
159when we're doing our planning for agenda meetings. But you would be the board contact. I'll work on the adren side and then that's how we would build this. So none of it is set in stone. It's very fluid especially as it comes to things like negotiations planning which is dependent on all sorts of different funding and decisions at the legislative level and things like that. But um I it's just like a starting point for next year and and there are some things that come up every month like consent agenda. Yeah. Can I add to the next month's future agenda already to get an over a bit more information on the contract for administrators and like maybe compare and contrast like what the administration will be losing once all those grandfather people are gone. So we
160might have to go into close. That would definitely be a close session item. Yes. So, okay. So, those are the action items that I have. Did I get them all? I believe so. Yes. Right. All right. So, a motion to adjurnn. No, we're not yet. Yeah. Can you I guess so move. I'll second that. Voice. Okay. So 854 on my thing here. So 855 854 it doesn't is a journ. How come you have 854 and mine has 85? It just switched to 85. We're not on the same time. Okay. And then Mar Margaret, would you mind giving this to Lynn? I have the roll call on here and stuff. Good night everyone. Good seeing you. Have a good evening. I will.