Meeting on June 17 has been added in order for district to hit mandated deadlines
The Windsor Unified School District Board of Trustees will be holding an unscheduled board meeting on Thursday, June 17 in order to meet a few deadlines they would have otherwise missed by their change to one meeting a month. The meeting will be held virtually at 6 p.m.
After a lengthy opening, including a whopping 23 items on the consent calendar, the meeting will turn to its more meaty items.
There will be a report from the Windsor Education Foundation and an annual update from the districts English Learner Advisory Committee.
This will be followed up with a pair of public hearings for Local Control Accountability plan (LCAP) and 2021-22 budget. Both public hearings are required by state law to allow the public to have comment prior to adoption.
The first item under discussion/action is the elimination of additional positions within the district. According to the board packet, since all students are now issued laptop computers, the district has eliminated its stand-alone computer labs. The labs at Mattie Washburn and Brooks Elementary were overseen by hourly, classified employees that are no longer needed for these assignments.
The packet also states that the shared account clerk that once served both those campuses has recently been vacated due to a promotion. Based on a needs assessment at both of these elementary campuses, a full-time secretary III at each campus is needed in place of the account clerk, and can be afforded more readily due to the elimination of the computer lab positions. Finally, according to the packet, the yard duty position at Brooks has been chronically hard to fill and remains vacant, and it has been determined that the hours can be better used by creating a student advisor position.
The vacancy created by the announced retirement of long-term Chief Business Officer (CBO) Lois Standring has proven difficult to fill, so the board is being asked to consider a consultant to recruit for the position. According to the board packet, “the district has been actively recruiting for a (CBO) to succeed (Standring) since she announced her departure in May. Since there are several openings for similar positions in Sonoma County and very few candidates available, the district is considering entering into a contract to conduct and manage a search.”
In relation to Standring’s imminent departure and the lack of a successor the board will also consider a temporary contract for business services. “During the time the district is actively recruiting for a (CBO) to succeed (Standring), there will be an ongoing need to support business services for WUSD. Rather than hire an Interim CBO, the district is considering the services of Total School Solutions. This organization is well respected with individuals having deep experience in management areas that will need ongoing support while a new CBO is being recruited and hired. Although the district will be supported by this organization, our primary contact will be Joe Pandolfo. (Pandolfo) is highly experienced and well-regarded in Sonoma County school districts, states the board packet.
The board will also be considering a pair of new job descriptions: coordinator of child development programs and coordinator of district communications.
The coordinator of child development programs position “was conceived to address a strategic direction of the district to radically improve services for Windsor families in two areas: preschool education and child care. This position will oversee capital development programs to expand services in both of these areas, and will also serve to manage and oversee these new offerings. These improved services in preschool and before and after school programs for the district are designed to 1) Improve the experience for students and families attending Windsor schools, and 2) Attract additional students and families to attend Windsor schools and thereby improve revenues,” states the board packet, adding “since the district anticipates interest from a variety of qualified candidates, this position has been written for both certificated and classified administrators. The district is only creating one position, but will review candidates who fit either set of qualifications.
The coordinator of district communications position “was conceived to address a strategic direction of the district to improve communications to our diverse community. This position will oversee online, print and in-person communications to better engage with and communicate to our internal and external audiences. These improved communication services will 1) Better inform our students and families of all that WUSD offers, and 2) Better engage staff, students, families and community stakeholders in Windsor and 3) Attract additional students and families to attend Windsor schools and thereby improve revenues,” according to the board packet.
The June 17 meeting of the WUSD board of trustees will be held via Zoom and streamed live to YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTC8qiAOAh8Qd77KSW7c8wA
Comments will only be taken during public comment. If you wish to make a comment during public comment, please email Jenny Cox at jc**@wu**.org, the subject line should read, Public Comment for The Board Meeting, June 17th, 2021. The length of the emailed comment should be three minutes, which is customarily allowed for verbal comments, which is approximately 400 words. If your emailed comment is received by 4 p.m. on the day of the meeting, it will be provided to the trustees, and made publicly available under public comment. Every effort will be made to read emails received after that time, but the district cannot guarantee such emails will be read during the meeting, although they will still be included in the administrative record.
