JERMALL WRIGHT (file photo) Brian Chilson

Thursday night, the Little Rock School Board held its first meeting of 2023. The board had a rocky year last year. Its most important accomplishment was to hire Jermall Wright to be the new superintendent. He is still in the honeymoon phase of his new job, but as Thursday’s meeting showed, he is making big changes to our district in terms of personnel and how we actually deliver education.

The meeting was the first with Michael Mason as the president of the board. Mason represents Zone 1 in southwest Little Rock. This zone has a population of 20,120 people. It is made up of 79% minorities. Mason and I have not always agreed on issues, but it is clear he is a passionate advocate for kids and is focused on what our district can do best to help all kids, especially those we have left behind generation after generation.

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The board began tonight with its work session.

Reports and Discussion

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The board first finalized the superintendent’s evaluation timeline. The board is responsible for making sure that the superintendent is doing his job and implementing the goals of the board. This is a good thing. It has historically not been done in Little Rock and may be one factor in why we had so much trouble keeping superintendents. This will allow the board to communicate with Wright and let him know how he is doing. It also provides legal protection and general fairness for Wright.

Next, the administration reported to the board that over the next few months different subcommittees will be reporting to the board on how the district will be implementing Wright’s tiered management and instruction program. As I have said previously, this is the most substantial realignment of the Little Rock School District in decades.

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Next, the district discussed its ideas for leader and teacher incentives. Wright said this is just a discussion starter and not a final plan, but that he has discussed this with teachers from the Personnel Policy Committee and the principals’ roundtable. This would be funded for the 2023-24 school year by the federal ESSER funds. To fund this program post-2024, they are discussing restarting the LRSD Foundation.

Under this proposal, leaders at priority schools could get a $10,000 supplement. They would have to sign a three-year contract and then the first $6,000 would be added to the salary just for leading a priority school and if they meet the district’s growth goals they could receive the other $4,000. Other school leaders could receive a $2,500 supplement. Teachers at priority schools could get up to $6,500. Non-=priority school leaders could get up to $2,500. Teachers could get $1,500. This reward would be based on meeting school-wide growth incentives.

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Evelyn Callaway asked if this was merit pay. Wright said that he considers merit pay to be that which goes to individuals. This money is based on the whole work of the building. If everyone meets the growth goal then everyone gets the reward. Vicki Hatter asked if the board would control the foundation funds and have oversight? Reginald Ballard, Wright’s chief of staff, said they will be working through those details as they talk.

It is essential that the board have full control over all money that is spent in our schools. Ali Noland wanted to know why the supplements were not more equitable between leaders and teachers. In my opinion, teachers do the hard work and deserve equal or more than leaders. Wright pointed out that the incentive for teachers is a minimum. It will probably be larger depending on the fund of money the district has. The leader fund will not go up. District staff promised go back and look at adding the supplement to all staff members in the school buildings. Pre-k centers will not get any supplements. This seems shortsighted based on what we know our pre-K teachers provide to students. The board should find a way to acknowledge the value of all pre-K teachers in the district. Noland made the case once again that this board must make sure all the priority schools have the resources they need to meet their goals.

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The administration then reported to the board that they are reworking how one becomes a principal at one of our schools. The goal of the new program is to “establish a consistent, transparent and comprehensive process to identify high-quality principal candidates for LRSD schools.” According to the draft documents, the district will no longer post individual school principal vacancies but will develop a generic principal pool job description. Once applications are screened those who pass the initial screening will be invited to interviews with committees. If they pass the interview they will be placed in a principal pool. Once the pool is created only sitting LRSD principals and individuals admitted to the pool will be eligible to interview or be appointed to vacant principal position. If someone comes to the district with a record of achievement as a principal in another district, they will be put into the pool without the interview process. Wright made it clear that there are three ways to become a principal in LRSD:

1. Wright can appoint an interim principal and hire a permanent person later.
2. Wright may reassign a sitting principal or qualifying district employee to a vacant position.
3. Or there can be a full competitive interview process.

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I think this is an interesting idea and does streamline the process. I also think it has the potential of stopping the buddy system where administrators pick their friends for jobs.

Next, the board heard a report on enrollment projections. Because the district has set the goal to have teacher contracts in place for the 2023-24 school year before spring break in March, they have to get school enrollment projections done quickly. The administration is using a new method this year. In the past, the district has relied solely on pre-registration numbers to determine enrollment projections, which always resulted in teacher positions being cut and then having to be added back later when we had a last-minute surge of students. What Wright and his team are going to do is to look at the last 10 years of enrollment data and make projections based on school-specific enrollment trends. This is a great idea. Although the projections will not be perfect, the district can learn and over time we will get better at projecting where we need teachers. The good news for teachers and staff is this will hopefully alleviate the stress of losing a position only to see it added back after you are settled in another school.

The enrollment projections for secondary schools will be more complicated. The administration will look at enrollment, the number of classes that teachers are teaching and at the number of the same classes being offered at the same time. The goal will be to level the class size for core classes. The magic number for a core class to meet will be 15 students. This will not apply to AP or specialty classes. Example: Four sections of chemistry offered at the same time with 8, 9, 6, and 15 kids. They want to level the classes and fix the master schedule. The rule for AP and elective classes will be 10 kids. They will stack classes. German 4 and German 3 might be put together to save the classes. Shana Loring, executive director of teaching and learning director of secondary education, is making these decisions with data from each individual school and is then meeting with school leaders to take into account the space and available resources.

Callaway wanted to know how teachers would be moved if that was required to level a school. Loring said that there are already HR policies that would determine who is moved. Robert Robinson, director of recruiting and EEOC, explained that the Personnel Policy manual has guidelines that are rooted in seniority. Callaway raised a good question and the board should look over the manual. Noland pointed out that the Personnel Policy Committee developed the manual and the board approved it.

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In connection to this enrollment issue, Wright sent an email to principals on Dec. 21, 2022, in which he explained a couple of issues that will be of interest to many.

First, as we already announced on the Our Schools, Our Community page, Dr. Wright confirmed to the principals that Rockefeller Early Childhood will be closing next year for renovations. Infants and toddlers will be reassigned to Geyer Springs. They still have to find space for 12 classes (232 students) of 3- and 4-year-olds.

Second, Wright states that the district is way overstaffed at the secondary level districtwide. He said, “We will not be able to achieve the last step for teacher raises or allocate much-needed fiscal and human resources to our identified district priorities without eliminating excess teacher units.” Yes, he called teachers, “teacher units.” This is disturbing news and I hope that at some point there will be a public explanation of this.

The board ended their work session and took a short break.

Special Session

When the board came back from their break, they entered a special meeting so that the board could vote on personnel issues. First, Wright wanted to make some personnel changes. Our downtown administration is being changed. Wright has hired Dr. Michael Henry for a new position called chief human resources and talent management. This will replace the position of executive director. Henry will start on Feb. 1 and will be paid $155,533 per year with an educational stipend of $1,000, a $1,200 car allowance, and up to $3,000 to relocate here. Henry has a Ph.D. from Florida A&M in educational leadership. He comes to us from Allentown Public Schools where he was director of human resources and before that he was regional superintendent for middle schools in Duval County Public schools in Florida. He appears to have about 2.5 years of human resource work. This was approved unanimously.

Former Parkview High School principal Philicia Bell, who was allowed to give up her principal’s position, was assigned to be administrator on special assignment. There will be no change to her salary this year. There was a very strange abdication agreement with her. In the document, it shows that Wright has agreed to put her in a school or district-level administrative or administrative support position for the 2023-24 school year without an application and interview process. I’m not sure this will stand up legally. How does this protect equal opportunities for others to apply for all jobs? Are we done with equity now that the court is no longer looking over our shoulders? Are we back to the old practice of just creating jobs for troubling employees? This was approved with Hatter abstaining.

The board also approved the hiring of Dexter Booth as a high school adviser to help with the transitions at Parkview. And it appointed Eric Henderson as the interim principal at Parkview. I know that faculty and parents are excited about the changes at Parkview and we are already hearing of good changes being made. This was approved unanimously.