Principals at each of the schools are identifying one parent and one staff member to serve on the task force, and one community member is being identified by each Board member. These members will be participating in four task force meetings and a couple of community meetings, where we aim to gather feedback from across the district. The process will have minimal impact on daily operations at this time. Once we have the recommendations and the Board develops an action plan for the district to implement, we will know more about the direct impact to campuses, staff, parents, students and our community.
We are not planning to reduce staff. In fact, we are struggling to fill vacancies and see a turnover rate of between 15-20% each year. We suspect this process of redesigning our programs and resources will in fact support our efforts to fill vacant positions and get us closer to ensuring every child is paired with a permanent teacher.
In the event the recommendation by the task force is to combine campuses, we will evaluate the potential use of facilities that benefit our students and our community. These decisions and determinations will be developed in the Spring once we have final input from this redesign process.
We will share with the task force the facilities assessment that was compiled by TASB and shared with the Blue-Ribbon Committee that evaluated all facilities in 2018. Since that report, the staff have been maintaining campus infrastructure data, including maintenance and repairs, remodeling, and maintenance records. Combined with the TASB report information, staff will share this data with the committee as part of the criteria they are charged with evaluating.