At their biannual retreat Monday, a majority of Columbus Municipal School District trustees said they would support elected board members.
The vote arose when the board filled out a Mississippi School Board Association survey on legislative concerns. The first question addressed elected vs. appointed boards.
The board determined by a 3-2 vote it supported legislation requiring school board members to be elected. Board President Angela Verdell and Secretary Currie Fisher opposed and board members Josie Shumake, Frederick Sparks and Jason Spears supported the idea.
Currently, the elected Columbus City Council appoints municipal school district trustees. The school board appoints the school district superintendent.
Sparks told The Dispatch Tuesday morning he meant to support appointed boards during the retreat but he had misunderstood the question. He said he believed it would be cheaper for taxpayers to have appointed board members.
“You minimize the politics behind it,” he said. “And then having … one appointed to the position, you won’t have to go through the cost on the taxpayers as far as having to have an actual election and things of that nature. That would be more money out of taxpayers’ pocket to have an actual election.”
Shumake and Spears both said they supported elected board members because that system would better include the public in school district matters.
“I think it’s better because it gives the community a stake in the school board,” Shumake said. “It gives them a closer stake. Obviously … the city council, they are representatives of the people. I understand that. But I think if you had elected school board officials, it would give the community more stake in the public school district, and I think that’s important.”
Spears agreed.
“I just think that if you’re going to have appointed superintendents, then you should have board members who are elected to give the … tax paying public some say in how that works,” he said.
Verdell said she opposed a law requiring elected school board members because she believes politics shouldn’t be involved in determining who governs children’s education.
“To me it allows for people who really want to serve to kind of state their position as to why they want to serve,” she said. “And sometimes when positions are elected for something like school board and superintendent, it becomes more of a popularity or a political type of thing versus people who are really, sincerely concerned about the situations of school districts.”
She later added an appointed system allows board members to make decisions for the good of students rather than ones that will help them win re-election.
The Dispatch could not reach Fisher for comment by press time.
District goals
During the retreat, the board also worked with a representative from the Mississippi School Board Association to discuss updating the district’s educational goals.
Mamie Lilley, MSBA manager of training and events, helped the board identify ways to write goals so that its members can know whether they are being met throughout the school year using benchmark data coming out of the district. That data could involve several areas, from test scores and enrollment to behavioral incidents throughout the year.
“We want to make sure that we are looking at quarterly benchmarks, that we are not only receiving the benchmark but that we are putting expectations in place for what we do with the information,” Verdell said.
In particular, she said, the board needs to set realistic financial goals.
CMSD’s current goals were written about two years ago, Verdell said. The board wanted to review them and see what could be tweaked or changed outright.
It will take at least two months, Verdell said, for the board to rewrite and approve the new goals.
CMSD has board retreats twice a year, once in the summer and once around January. In the summer, Verdell said, the trustees usually invite someone from MSBA to work with them and advise them on some aspect of the board’s duties. Lilley has worked with the board in the past.
Lilley also had the board fill out the MSBA survey on state legislative priorities, a survey all boards that are members of MSBA complete annually. The survey questions involve topics ranging from school funding and charter schools to board member compensation.
CMSD’s board determined its top priority for the upcoming legislative year is the Mississippi Adequate Education Program funding formula, a law that would ensure the Legislature has to fund state education according to a formula.
Since 1997, the Legislature has fully funded MAEP only twice.
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