NEWS

77 new board members to attend orientation June 14
Seven WVSBA officer positions to be filled due to May election defeats

Seventy-seven county board members-elect will participate in the West Virginia School Board Association’s Orientation ’06. They will be joined by 71 veteran county board members and nine county superintendents.

The 2½-day program is June 14-16 at Stonewall Resort in Roanoke, W.Va. The session begins at 10 a.m. Wednesday, June 14, and will adjourn by noon Friday, June 16.

The program, as approved by the state Board of Education at its May meeting in Moorefield, will be posted on WVSBA’s Web site early next week.

According to nonpartisan county board election results, as tallied by WVSBA, 76 individuals are newly elected, including six who were appointed to board positions and then successfully were elected.

New board majorities were elected in Barbour, Calhoun, Fayette, Hampshire, Jefferson, Ohio and Wood counties. In Wood County, two previously appointed members were elected for inaugural terms along with another newly elected member.

WVSBA Executive Director Howard M. O’Cull, Ed.D., said no statewide issues seemed to cause the defeat of incumbents. Instead, he pointed to local or “isolated” matters such as county superintendent contracts and benefits; community groups’ reimbursement for transportation expenses; support for school reconfiguration; bus operators’ opposition to county board rules regarding an interpretation of federal wage and hour laws and community disapproval of county board policy directions.

“Because the 2006 Primary was in an ‘off-election’ year that doesn’t include a presidential vote, and in which most of the other races either weren’t sexy or didn’t generate much discussion or enthusiasm, voters focused more on county board of education members’ election,” O’Cull said.

Those factors may work to the advantage of challengers, he said.

Seven members of WVSBA’s governing board were defeated, including President Debbie Thompson (Pleasants), President-elect Lyle Spencer (Nicholas) and Financial Officer Carlene Frederick (Calhoun). Regional officers Johanna Rorrer (Mason), Region II associate director; Missy Smith (Fayette), Region IV associate director; Donna Davis (Pleasants), Region V director; and Lori Stilley, Ph.D. (Jefferson), Region VIII director, also lost re-election bids.

Region V Director Melanie Hummel (Marshall) did not seek re-election. The election of Sally Cann (Harrison) as incoming financial officer creates a vacancy for the Region VII associate director position.

Thompson said the WVSBA Executive Board will determine the process for filling executive officer positions at its June 15 meeting in conjunction with Orientation ’06. The meeting is open to WVSBA members, county superintendents, Orientation attendees and the public.

The School Board Association’s attorney, Howard E. Seufer Jr., has outlined the options for filling the positions as specified in the organization’s Constitution and Bylaws.

“Because . . . most of the other races either weren’t sexy or didn’t generate much discussion or enthusiasm, voters focused more on county board of education members’ election.” – WVSBA Executive Director Howard M. O’Cull, Ed.D.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The primary option would require incoming association officers to appoint a nominating committee whose report would be made at September’s Delegate Assembly meeting. Officers then would be elected to serve until the FY07 Annual Business Meeting in February, at which time FY08 officers would be selected, based on directives in the Constitution and Bylaws.

Under legislation enacted in 1989, county board majorities are voted upon every four years, with the first such election occurring in 1994.

WVSBA is governed by a 26-member Executive Board which includes five executive officers – president, president-elect, vice president, financial officer, immediate past president – 16 regional officers, and four current past presidents serving as county board members.

The WVSBA Executive Board will determine the process for filling executive officer positions at its June 15 meeting.

(All association past presidents currently serving as county board members are eligible, upon their written request, to serve on the Executive Board.)

The WVSBA Executive Director serves as Board Secretary-Treasurer and is an ex officio (non-voting) member of the board.

 

 

State considers streamlined grievance procedure
Senator wants action on ‘ineffective and costly system’ by next session

By Jim Wallace

An effort to streamline the grievance procedure for teachers and other public employees is moving again after failing to pass during the Legislature’s regular session in March.

“We have an ineffective and costly system in place,” said Sen. Ed Bowman, D-Hancock, as he presided over a legislative interim meeting May 23. He noted that lawmakers have studied the grievance procedure for two years and said he wants reforms passed in next year’s session.

In March, a grievance reform bill had support from 24 of the 34 members of the West Virginia Senate, but it died when it fell short of the four-fifths majority required for a final reading on the last day the Senate could consider its own bills. That disappointed leaders of the West Virginia Education Association and the West Virginia chapter of the American Federation of Teachers.

But Martha Dean, executive director of the West Virginia Association of School Administrators, was relieved. Although she believed the grievance process should be reformed, she objected to provisions of the bill that would have introduced binding arbitration for resolving disputes involving teachers.

Sen. Ed Bowman, D-Hancock, said binding arbitration could provide for the sharing of costs between parties.

Since then, Earl Maxwell, who has been director of the West Virginia Education and State Employees Grievance Board since January, has been working on the new proposal he presented to the Government Organization Subcommittee C during the May interim meetings. His plan would not include binding arbitration but he said he would “like to enhance the opportunity for mediation at all levels.”

Maxwell would like to reduce the number of levels in the process from four to three. The first level would be for an employee to take a grievance to a supervisor. The next level would be the chief administrator in that employee’s division. The final step would be to go to the state grievance board, which Maxwell wants to rename the West Virginia Employment Dispute Resolution Board.

His plan would eliminate the option of appealing the board’s ruling to circuit court, except for constitutional issues. However, an employee would have the choice to go directly to circuit court without going through the regular three-level process.

Maxwell said most of the costs of grievance cases come at the end of the process when they are appealed to circuit court. Thus, he reasons, those costs could be reduced significantly if the opportunity to appeal to the court is limited.

Also to simplify the system, Maxwell wants to handle all employees through the same process instead of having one for school employees, another for state workers and both for higher education employees, depending on their job classifications.

Bowman requested more information on salaries and expenses for the board’s administrative law judges, as well as how many cases find their way to circuit court and what that costs the state. Maxwell did not have all of that information, but he said the board has five administrative law judges and an overall budget of $900,000, which it never fully uses. The judges’ salaries range from $53,000 to $65,000.

About 500 cases each year go through the fourth level of the process, and 30 to 50 go to circuit court, but Maxwell said he did not know how much those cases cost. He later told Delegate Ron Walters, R-Kanawha, that the board is not usually notified when cases go to circuit court.

About 500 cases go through the fourth level grievance process each year, with 30 to 50 of them progressing to circuit court.

Bowman said he was troubled that employees get paid to go to grievance hearings. Maxwell said the reasoning behind that is that witnesses in cases should not be penalized for going to hearings. But he said he is working on using video conferencing to cut down on travel by employees for such hearings. Having that capability would cost about $400 a month, but Maxwell is trying to reduce it.

Delegate Linda Longstreth, D-Marion, said she is concerned about whether there would be a way to review decisions of administrative law judges. Maxwell said his proposal is to have three administrative law judges sit as a panel to review another’s decisions.

That was not sufficient for Longstreth. Maxwell called her objections fair criticism and invited other suggestions. Throughout his presentation, he said lawmakers would have to make key decisions on how the process would be structured.

Bowman said there is a perception that administrative law judges are biased. He said binding arbitration could provide for the sharing of costs between the parties. Maxwell replied that he is open to debate on whether there should be cost sharing by the employees, but he would leave that up to the Legislature.

In the end, Bowman said what he wants is a “fair and equitable and cost-efficient system.”

Jim Wallace is a former government reporter for the Charleston Daily Mail and former news director of West Virginia Public Radio. He now works for TSG Consulting in Charleston and writes for several national and West Virginia publications.

 

State superintendent wants more rigorous curricula with 21st century skills
WVDE revisiting all content standards, spokeswoman says

Increasing the rigor of curricula in West Virginia schools was a key topic State Superintendent Steve Paine discussed with lawmakers during the May legislative interim meetings. The ways the state is integrating 21st century skills into classroom work made up a major portion of his presentation to the Legislative Oversight Commission on Education Accountability.

Liza Cordeiro, the Education Department’s director of communications, said the department is revisiting all content standards. The idea is to continue to focus on core subjects but also to promote critical thinking, problem solving and technological literacy.

She said the Education Department is about to review its assessment systems to make sure they align with what is being taught and including those 21st century skills. That could result in more frequent classroom assessments to augment what is derived from the WESTEST.

In addition, the WVDE is bringing back a leadership academy for principals after its absence for many years. The West Virginia Institute for 21st Century Leadership will be in Charleston July 16 through 21. Another new resource is an electronic learning platform recently introduced to provide online professional development for teachers and principals.

Paine said he wants to increase the number of national board certified teachers from 245 to more than 1,200. Cordeiro said such certification is one good way to ensure teachers have the critical-thinking and problem-solving skills they need to instill in students.

Paine reminded lawmakers that West Virginia has fared well in recent national reports. He said for the third straight year, the state won top honors in the Quality Counts report (See https://wvde.state.wv.us/news/1124) and Education Week Magazine’s Technology Counts report honored West Virginia for having the best educational technology system in the nation (See https://wvde.state.wv.us/news/1180).

He also said the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University ranked West Virginia fifth in the nation in providing access to state-funded early childhood education for four-year-old children (https://wvde.state.wv.us/news/1187).

 

Topics to be reviewed during 2006 legislative interim meetings

Interim subcommittees/topics

(1) Education Subcommittee A - Public Education Subcommittee

● Senate Concurrent Resolution 6 - Requesting Joint Committee on Government and Finance study public school dress codes and uniforms

● SCR 66 - Requesting Joint Committee on Government and Finance study employment process of public school coaches

● House Concurrent Resolution 70 - Requesting the Joint Committee on Government and Finance to conduct a study on the need for and the appropriate methodology for providing salary improvements for counselors employed by the Division of Rehabilitation Services

(2) Education Subcommittee B - No Child Left Behind

● SCR 75 - Requesting Joint Committee on Government and Finance study cost and other issues associated with No Child Left Behind

(3) Education Subcommittee C - School Aid Formula

● This subcommittee will continue its study of the School Aid Formula pursuant to SCR 103, Regular Session 2005.

Additionally, the Legislative Oversight Commission on Education Accountability will study the following issues in addition to its regular responsibilities:

● SCR 42 - Requesting Joint Committee on Government and Finance study vocational, technical and adult education

● Monitoring implementation of the Pilot Program of Structured In-School Alternatives to enforce the Student Code of Conduct per HCR 78.

Source: Hank Hager, Senate Education Committee Counsel.

 

Suspended director hopes suit clears name

By Michelle James
Beckley Register-Herald

Though suspended RESA I executive director Carol Morgan will retire effective July 1 regardless of the outcome of the lawsuit she filed against the West Virginia state Board of Education last week, Morgan says she hopes the complaint will help clear her name and save the reputation she says she has worked hard at building over a 41-year career in education.

“I would like to know I could retire as a successful educator,” Morgan said.

The board voted on May 1 to suspend Morgan for 90 days without pay for failure to properly oversee finances of RESA I, the Beckley-based educational agency that has been in the spotlight over the past several months following allegations that former finance manager and executive secretary Deborah Calhoun Mitchell embezzled more than $1 million.

A plea hearing for Mitchell, who has since been charged with embezzling $1.3 million and for filing a false federal income tax return, is scheduled for May 22 in U.S. District Court in Beckley.

Morgan’s lawsuit, which was filed in Kanawha County Circuit Court, alleges the state board violated her rights, in that on March 23, it voted to suspend her without properly expressing in its agenda that it planned to discuss disciplinary actions against anyone. (The board announced it hadn’t followed proper procedure and rescinded the decision two weeks later.)

Also, Morgan and her attorney Erwin Conrad said during the same meeting board members went into executive session without giving her the option of a public meeting — something that violates state law.

“They violated the open meetings act,” he said.

Conrad says the board made mistakes in following its own policy on several occasions and hopes the lawsuit forces it to better follow its own rules and regulations.

“They need to honor the basic rights of someone,” he said. “We hope they recognize their numerous illegal acts.”

The complaint also alleges the state board held Morgan responsible for job duties not outlined in her job description.

While, in its decision to suspend Morgan, board members and state superintendent of schools Steven Paine said she had failed to take proper fiscal responsibility for RESA I, Morgan says, the Raleigh County Board of Education, not she, is the fiscal agent for the agency and board members have never told her exactly what she failed to do.

“The thing that bothers me about this,” Morgan said, “is that the state board of education nor the state superintendent never sat down with me and said, ‘Carol, you have broken this policy or this law or have not followed this procedure.’ That’s what bothers me the most.”

Since her suspension took effect, Morgan has received no pay and has had to pay for her insurance benefits out of pocket.

In the complaint, Morgan asks that she receive back pay and all benefits and any damages the court deems fair.

“This has been a devastating thing,” she said. “I’m very, very proud of the work I’ve done and don’t want to leave with them (board members) saying the things they’ve said about me.”

In the wake of Morgan’s suspension, the board appointed retiring Lincoln County Schools Superintendent Bill Grizzell as interim director of RESA I, which serves McDowell, Mercer, Monroe, Raleigh, Summers and Wyoming counties.

This article originally appeared May 14, 2006 in the Beckley Register-Herald. It was reprinted with permission of The Register-Herald, http://www.register-herald.com. The author may be reached by e-mail at mjames@register-herald.com.

 

WVSBA Briefs

Orientation ’06 The West Virginia School Boards Association’s Orientation ’06 is June 14-16 at Stonewall Resort in Roanoke, W.Va. The program begins at 10 a.m. Wednesday, June 14, and will conclude about noon on Friday, June 16.

All 77 newly-elected county board members as well as 71 veteran members and nine county superintendents are registered to attend the program.

The lineup of speakers for the Orientation includes:

• Dan Tollett, Ph.D., former Tennessee School Boards Association executive director
• Jim Slaughter, an attorney and registered parliamentarian
• Lewis Brewer, executive director of the state Ethics Commission
• Howard E. Seufer Jr., Esq., WVSBA counsel, an attorney with Bowles Rice McDavid Graff & Love
• Joe Panetta, director of the West Virginia Department of Education’s Office of School Finance
• Lyn Guy, Ed.D., who will lead a panel discussion about board-superintendent relations. She will be joined by Wetzel County Schools Superintendent Paul “Butch” Barcus, Ed.D., and Putnam County Schools Superintendent Charles “Chuck” Hatfield.

Attendees also will participate in small-group discussions about school board leadership, decision- and policymaking. They will discuss an ethics case study titled, “Dan’s Creek High School and The Da Vinci Code Incident,” which was written by WVSBA Executive Director Howard M. O’Cull, Ed.D.

Discussion leaders include WVSBA President Debbie Thompson (Pleasants), Region I Director Mike Mitchem (McDowell), Vice President Kim Cooper (Raleigh), Financial Officer Carlene Frederick (Calhoun) and O’Cull.

If you want to attend the program or have general questions about the Orientation, please contact Conference Registrar Shirley Davidson at sdavidson@wvsba.org. Program-related questions should be addressed to O’Cull at hocull@wvsba.org.

 

Legislative session videoconference tapes

WVSBA has produced a videotape about legislation enacted during the 2006 Regular Session of the state Legislature. In the video, association counsel Howard E. Seufer Jr., discusses each public education-related bill enacted during the Regular Session that concluded in March.

County board members who view the videotape will receive two hours of school board member training credits.

This is the 13th year in which WVSBA has provided a videotaped analysis of legislation enacted during a legislative session. Seufer, of the law firm Bowles Rice McDavid Graff & Love, has been the primary presenter for each program.

For more information about the program, please contact the WVSBA office.

 

Training hours

County board members will receive a listing of training hours completed to date following the completion of Orientation ’06. If you do not have the required seven clock hours’ school board member training, based on WVSBA records, please contact Executive Director Howard O’Cull to determine how to meet the statutory training requirement.

The WVSBA/West Virginia Board of Education School Board Member Training Standards Review Committee (TSRC) is responsible for determining matters regarding county board member training.

The group last met in April.

 

Membership Subscription Fees

The WVSBA office has received $58,722 in FY07 Membership Subscription Fees (MSFs) or dues from 15 counties, including dues payments from the Grant, Greenbrier, Hancock, Jackson, Jefferson, Lincoln, Mercer, Morgan, Nicholas, Pleasants, Preston, Roane, Wayne, Wood and Wyoming County Boards of Education.

Executive director evaluation

WVSBA Executive Director Howard M. O’Cull’s performance evaluation will occur in conjunction with the Association’s June Orientation sessions at Stonewall Resort.

Comments regarding O’Cull’s performance should be directed to WVSBA President Debbie Thompson (Pleasants). She may be reached by e-mail at debthom@charter.net or by telephone at (304) 665-2187.

WVSBA directory information

Orientation ’06 attendees will be asked to complete WVSBA directory information, including their names, addresses, e-mail addresses, and telephone and fax numbers. A directory form will be mailed to county board members and superintendents in early July.

The directory will be distributed prior to the 2006 WVSBA Conference in September at the Charleston Marriott.

The free directory is distributed to WVSBA members, county superintendents and board executive secretaries.

No vendors, political organizations or architects receive the directory, although membership mailing labels, as maintained by WVSBA, are distributed to state agencies, including the West Virginia Department of Education.

2006 Handbook

The 2006 edition of the WVSBA Handbook will be distributed at conference ’06. Gilbert E. “Gene” Bailey (Mercer) heads the handbook committee, whose members also include State Board of Education members Delores Cook (Boone) and Burma Hatfield (Mingo).

For more information on the Handbook, please contact the WVSBA office.

2006 WVSBA Conference

The School Board Association’s Conference ’06 is September 22/23, 2006 at the Charleston Marriott. Preliminary information will be mailed to members in July.

 

Commentary

Monitor school spending in W.Va.

Editorial from the Wheeling News-Register

Contrary to what some West Virginians may believe, responsibility for public education in our state rests with the state Board of Education. Local entities operate schools and related facilities at the will and pleasure of state board members, in effect.

In terms of school quality, the state board and state Department of Education rule with what some view as an iron hand; several county school systems have been taken over and operated by the state during recent years. But when it comes to financial affairs, it appears that the state does not exercise comparable oversight.

That conclusion may well be the one reached by those aware of what happened at a regional education service agency in southern West Virginia. There, according to law enforcement officials, the executive secretary of RESA I embezzled $1.3 million from 1998 through Jan. 31 of this year.

State Board of Education members this week suspended the RESA I executive director, Carol Morgan, without pay for 90 days. The action was taken because Morgan allegedly failed to oversee the agency’s finances adequately. While she is serving her suspension, an official named by the state will oversee RESA I, which serves county school districts in McDowell, Mercer, Monroe, Raleigh, Summers and Wyoming counties.

Clearly, Morgan did not monitor finances very well. That would seem to be a given, in view of the amount her subordinate allegedly was able to loot from the agency’s bank accounts.

But what about state oversight? It appears that no one from state government noticed anything amiss during the about eight years that former Executive Secretary Deborah Mitchell allegedly was enriching herself at taxpayers’ expense.

In addition to coming down hard on RESA I officials — as they should — state board members should be asking questions about state oversight of RESAs and county boards of education throughout West Virginia. If additional audits are needed to ensure that outrages such as that at RESA I do not occur elsewhere, they should be implemented

This editorial originally appeared May 3, 2006, in the Wheeling News-Register, http://www.news-register.net. Reprinted with permission of the Wheeling News-Register.

 

ETC.

Soundbites

“Regardless of where the help comes from, Republican leaders are genuinely excited about their prospects in the House races in November. Several have taken me to task for reporting extensively on the race among House Democrats for the speaker’s job. The Republicans think they’ll be the ones at the December caucuses picking the speaker…”

- MetroNews Talkline Host Hoppy Kercheval in a May 24 commentary

“I can find comfort in knowing that I have received an excellent education in what is perhaps the best school in the entire state.”

– Senior Mildred “Micki” Biggs,” one of two Pickens High School graduates. The K-12 school is located in Randolph County.

 

"It is very nice. It has so much to offer.”

- Kaitlin Prichard, of West Hamlin, who will be a senior next year at Lincoln County High School in Hamlin. The consolidated school has been the subject heightened controversy the last several years.

 

“Students are concerned about fights with other students, they’re feeling like they’re getting a lot of busy work, that staff holds low expectations for them, that the instruction is routine, that there’s not a lot of fairness in the schools.”

– Hazel Palmer, Ed.D., executive director of The Education Alliance, discussing a recent Alliance Report that showed a “wide gap” of differing views between students and staff in low-income schools.

“I think it's deceptive: If you have 20 (black) kids in this school and you have 300 white kids, that's not impacting anybody at all. The legislation [the federal No Child Left Behind Act] was intended to affect your school if any of your subgroups aren't doing well…”

- Barbara Oden, a retired professor from West Virginia State University and a leader of Maximizing the Achievement of African-American Children in Kanawha County, who contends the state's practices for reporting student achievement data are unfair.

 

West Virginia Department of Education officials have defended the practice where racial groups (if they include fewer than 50 students) are not reported as an individual grouping. A recent Associated Press analysis found that in West Virginia, more than 55 percent of black students' test scores aren't reported because they fall under this guideline.

 

Meanwhile in Oregon . . .

This year’s graduating class at an Oregon high school features no fewer than 75 valedictorians. The honor traditionally is reserved for a single student, but Westview High School has chosen to define valedictorian as any student with a 4.0 grade point average, which this year included one in seven students.

“First of all you have to say ‘nice job,’” said Gene Evans of the Oregon Department of Education. “But it does kind of dilute what the tradition of valedictorian has meant.”

From The Week, May 12, 2006

Widsom

“Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.” – George Eliot (1819-1880) - pseudonym for Mary Ann Cross, also Marian Evans, Victorian British writer.

 

 

The Legislature is published by the West Virginia School Boards Association. It provides county board of education members, state policymakers, school administrators and the education community information and opinions regarding West Virginia legislative issues. The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect official opinion or policies of the WVSBA, unless specifically stated.

West Virginia School Boards Association
PO Box 1008
Charleston, WV 25324
Phone (304) 346-0571 • Fax (304) 346-0572 WVSBA.ORG

Debbie Thompson (Pleasants County), President
debthom@charter.net

Jean Westfall (Ritchie County), Chairman
WVSBA Committee on Communications*
Ljwm1108@ruralnet.org

Howard M. O’Cull, Ed. D., Executive Director, Editor
hocull@wvsba.org

Diane Slaughter, APR, CAE, Layout and Design
info@homesteadlane.com

Shirley M. Davidson, Administrative Assistant,
Production and Circulation
sdavidson@wvsba.org

* Committee on Communications: Judi Almond (Raleigh), Beth
Cercone (Clay), Bob Duckworth (Taylor), Despina “Dee”
Kaparoules (Mingo), David McCutcheon (Roane), Mike
Mitchem (McDowell), JoHanna Rorrer (Mason), Nancy Walker
(Monongalia), Don Tuttle (Wetzel), Hunter Williams (Hardy)

Vincit omnia veritas
“Truth conquers all”