White Co. School Board Discusses Role In Teacher Communications

A motion to add White County School Board members to the Teacher Advisory Board failed after discussion about how that would impact educators’ confidence in that line of communication.

Board Member Dewayne Howard brought up the concept citing a desire to know when teachers want to have improvements in the system. He said he also wants to be aware when complaints are lodged against school board members.

Director of Schools Kurt Dronebarger said questions or comments are submitted anonymously through Teacher Advisory Board representatives. The board meets once a month and is comprised of teacher representatives elected from each school.

“I’ll be glad to do it however you want to do it but I just think that it’s going to create a lot of confusion if they send you a question, I’m going to allow you to answer it until you tell me not to,” Dronebarger said. “I just think the way it is right now is if they want to address something with the school system they can address it with me, if they want to go above my head and address it with you they already have that ability.”

Dronebarger said that when anything pertinent to the school board came through the submittals, he passes it along to the members so they are aware. He said minor things such as payroll and time off, he answers them directly without communicating it to the board.

Board Member Sherrie Stone said she wants to make sure that if something pertains to the school board, it can come directly to them.

Board Chair Bob Young said he understands the desire to be informed and understand what is going on from a district level for teachers, but the board needs to be cautious of going down the road of appearing to manage staff. He made the motion to request Dronebarger communicate any questions or comments about the school board and Dronebarger’s responses.

“I would think that we would want them to have the tools in place to have good communication in place among administration and teachers and supports staff, whenever that may be, but I think that should stop at the director,” Young said. “The way it’s set up, if it comes up to a representative from that school and then that school brings it to a committee and they have those discussions I think that’s the lowest level that seems most logical to me.”

The motion failed for lack of a majority.

“I mean I understand from both sides of that, but just as Mr. Dronebargerr stated they know who they’re speaking to when they’re sending that,” Member Adam Hickey said.”They have an open line of communication with email and phone numbers on the website to directly send that to us. So if they’re making a complaint to him, about us, (…) they may only want him to hear. They may be venting to him.”