Loyal School Board approves teacher reassignments, cross-categorical teacher, roof bid

By Valorie Brecht As is often the case at the end of the school year, the Loyal School District is busy trying to determine staffing for next year, including filling any open positions that have come up. On the agenda for the April 22 regular school board meeting and April 29 special board meeting were several agenda items involving staffing, including the shuffling of roles. There also was discussion about who ought to be involved in hiring decisions and the need to act quickly to get candidates to come to Loyal before they were drawn away by some other school district’s offer.

Ultimately, the school board decided to reassign a current kindergarten teacher to cross-categorical special education, reassign a current second grade teacher to first grade and create an additional cross-categorical elementary special education teacher position. The board also discussed creating a shared elementary teacher position, but decided to table that until May 8, in order to set up a job sharing agreement and notify the parents whose students would be affected next year.

The board also decided that the interview committee could handle hiring decisions, although the board still has to officially approve new hires, but when it came to the creation or removal of positions, that would need to be discussed by the personnel committee or the board.

“So the board had said to take this to the personnel committee, but in going back in our policy, as of 2020 we had no personnel committee,” said Loyal School District Administrator Chris Lindner at the April 29 meeting. “We needed to do it without personnel, so that is why we called a special board meeting.”

In regards to the reassignment of teachers, kindergarten teacher Shannon Funston will go to the cross-categorical elementary special education position, which will be vacated by Annalyse Stratton at the end of the school year. Funston already has the licensure for that position, and it is easier to find an elementary teacher than it is to find a special education teacher.

Jennifer Walden will be reassigned to the open first grade position, which will be vacated by Natalie Ruttger at the end of the school year. The rationale for moving a second grade teacher to first grade is to have more experience at that grade level so there won’t be two new teachers (at least new to Loyal) for that grade.

“I have talked to both (teachers that would be moving). The one going to cross-categorical wants to. The one going to first has some reservations, but is willing to do it. I talked to her today and I think it will be OK,” said Lindner.

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from p. 1 Board member Derek Weyer asked Lindner why he thought the arrangement would work.

“I think she will help mentor the new teacher. And it will be a new experience for her,” said Lindner.

Board member Tom Odeen asked if there had been reassignments in the past. Lindner said not in the recent past, but there had been. He said it had been related to utilizing people’s teaching certifications. Odeen also clarified that it is in the teacher’s contract that the administration has the ability to reassign teachers as needed.

“It’s something that’s in their contract and we try not to spring it on them,” said Lindner.

The board did not have to vote to approve the reassignments, as it is already part of the contract, but the board did give the administration their verbal go-ahead.

The board also approved creating a cross-categorical elementary special education position.

“We talked about this last school board meeting. We ran short this year. The numbers and needs are more than we should handle,” said Lindner.

He said the three current special education teachers had done a good job of handling the caseload, but were being stretched thin.

“The main concern is increased needs. It’s more needs than numbers,” said Lindner. “This is an area where we need to make sure we are following the state’s special education mandates and are covered.”

He said that right now, one special education teacher was covering the entire elementary, grades K-5, which made it impossible to serve all students at an ideal time.

“We can’t get the schedules aligned with that many students. So we rely on pull-outs and students going to the high-needs room, which is not best practice,” he said, quoting from comments he had received from the school’s special education director, Lindsey Schubert.

He also noted that next fall, the school district would need additional support in 4K, and one student next year would need a fully replaced curriculum, so the need would be significantly increased.

Board president Dennis Roehl asked how the school district would pay for it. Lindner said the district had money available in Fund 27, the Special Education Fund, and the district receives federal payments for students who meet that criteria.

The board voted unanimously to add a cross-categorical special education teacher.

Additionally, the board discussed two individuals jointly teaching a section of fourth grade. The administration had been approached by two current teachers who were wanting to share a class next year, so each teacher would only be half-time. Part of the reasoning for that was one teacher not finding full-time childcare for her young children. She proposed working at school half-time and the other half she would be home with her kids.

Lindner said he had reached out to the Abbotsford School District, which has done this several years, in at least three different instances, and even has a teacher handbook section on it. He said the reports back from there were positive and there hadn’t been complaints.

“In talking with these two teachers, it isn’t for everyone, but I believe we have two teachers that would do a very good job,” he said.

One sticking point for the board was the current school district policy, which states that if a teacher is working at 50% or above, they are entitled to full benefits. So while the teachers would both have their salary cut in half, they would continue to receive full benefits.

“Receiving 100-percent benefits when they’re only here half time — that’s one heck of a raise,” said board member Kirk Haslow.

The board members discussed possibly prorating the benefits. However, that would require changing school policy.

The board decided to table the item to allow time to talk to the teachers and make sure they were still interested in sharing if not receiving full benefits, to send a letter to the parents of the students going into fourth grade next year, and to hash out the benefits issue and create a job-sharing policy for the teacher handbook.

Also at the April 29 meeting, the board approved the replacement of the roofs on the three-car garage, Vater Hall and the Lions shelter for $18,500 by Over the Top Roofing and Siding in Neillsville. The board received three bids and Over the Top’s was the cheapest.

April 22 meeting When four agenda items related to staffing came up in the regular board meeting — including reassignment of teachers, the cross-categorical position and teacher sharing that were discussed earlier in this article as well as adding a part-time school counselor — newly elected board member Matt Kubista made a motion, seconded by Weyer, to table those four items and return them to the personnel committee for further discussion.

With that, Kubista had a comment to make. “I’m not going to bore you, because we talked about it in closed session, a lot of questions I would have if this didn’t get tabled,” said Kubista. “I guess the one thing I wanted to bring up is … Mr. Lindner and I and Kirk (Haslow) had went to a recent WASB (Wisconsin Association of School Boards) meeting. It was stated by a member at that meeting that we are not to spring new information on administration at the open and closed meetings. I believe that is a courtesy that needs to go both ways, as this seems to happen quite often for board members as well. In order to build trust and provide transparency, committees need to be utilized. So that’s why I asked this to go back to personnel.”

He gave an example he has witnessed serving as the police chief for the City of Loyal. He said when a citizen brings an issue to a city council meeting and it cannot immediately be resolved, that issue is taken to the appropriate committee and citizens are invited to attend that meeting and be part of the discussion. The committee then makes a recommendation as necessary that it brings back to the council.

“When issues are brought up suddenly with no committee to follow up or discuss openly those concerns, it looks sneaky, as if it was trying to be pushed through with no input from those involved. This creates nothing but mistrust and why taxpayers are angry with how things are being run,” said Kubista.

The board voted to send the items to personnel, but as previously stated, after administration realized the board didn’t currently have a personnel committee, the items were sent to the whole board instead in the special meeting.

Hiring new teachers At the April 22 meeting, parent Nikki Rueth also expressed her concern in public comment after she learned that middle/high school science teachers Logan Fulwiler and Joe Treffinger would be leaving at the end of this school year.

“We’ve gone through five science teachers in three years. The turnover rate is very high. Where is the consistency when the kids are constantly getting a new teacher every year?” she asked.

The board voted to accept Fulwiler’s and Treffinger’s resignations at the meeting. In his resignation letter, Treffinger did not specify the reason he was leaving the district; however, Fulwiler said after much deliberation he was going to another school district for computer technology and he had decided to move on and pursue other interests in life.

The board also accepted the resignation of special education paraprofessional Erin Wilke.

Towards the end of the regular school board meeting, Principal Doug Dieckman asked for a point of clarification, if he would be free to offer people jobs before the board met next. He said he was hiring for a first grade position and two science positions, and the candidates he was interviewing were “being offered jobs left and right.” So, if he had to wait until the board approved a hire before offering the person the job, he would likely lose out on quality candidates because they already opted to go somewhere else.

“Over the past few years, it’s become they want a piece of paper from the school district saying, ‘Here’s what your contract is going to look like, here’s what your starting salary is going to look like,’” said Dieckman.

He said that typically the interview committee consisted of himself, district instructional coach Amy Humke, and two or three teachers in the subject area the candidate would teach, if possible. They then rank the candidates and he would start making calls. He said, in the past, he had offered candidates the job with the disclaimer that they would still have to be formally approved by the school board at their next meeting.

There was some discussion as to whether the personnel committee should be actively involved in the hiring process.

“The personnel committee looks at positions, not hires, the way I understand it,” said board president Dennis Roehl. “I would say he (Dieckman) should be able to, through the interview committee, make those hires. Is everyone good with Doug doing that?”

The other board members agreed.

Offering open positions to in-house staff At the public comment period at the end of the school board meeting, teacher Mark Rueth made a comment regarding open staff positions.

“When there were open positions, we had always asked in house if anyone was interested in that. Now that hasn’t been done,” he said.

He said the science teacher positions had been posted on WECAN (the Wisconsin Education Career Access Network, a job board for teachers), but the Loyal staff hadn’t been notified.

“You don’t offer it to people in here, but people are expecting that,” he said.

Upcoming meetings Upcoming school board meetings include the technology committee on May 6 at 3:30 p.m. in the conference room, a special board meeting on May 8 at 7 p.m. in the conference room and the regular board meeting on May 22 at 7 p.m. in the conference room.