Willoughby Updates School Board on Personnel

Director of Schools Mark Willoughby presented his monthly report on personnel to the Board of Education Thursday night.
Those employed since last month include Wallace Caldwell, Gregory Muskopf, and Dwayne Cornelius as substitute bus drivers, Santos Cabellero as cafeteria worker, and Keith Huling in transportation,.
Debbie Parchman was transferred from a substitute teacher position to an educational assistant at DCHS.
Amy Tobitt, DCHS teacher, was granted a leave of absence as requested.
Larry Johnson, Materials Supervisor has resigned.
Willoughby announced that Johnson’s position will not be filled. “I just wanted to let the board know that my intention is to reorganize our supervisory personnel, taking into consideration the fact that we not be filling our material supervisor position. It is my plan to divide the position of curriculum and instructional supervisor (pre-k through 12th grade) into a pre-k through 6th grade and a 7th through 12th grade curriculum instructor supervisor. Michelle Burklow will take over the pre-k through 6th grade and Dr. Carol Hendrix will take over the 7th through 12th grade. At the same time, I will delegate the responsibilities of the materials supervisor position to our different supervisors. I will also post the position for a new federal programs director. We will take applications through the month of December. We will start interviewing in January. I think these moves will be real good for the children of our school system. Our folks (supervisors) will be able to be in the classrooms and into the schools more and I think it will make our education more efficient for the children.”
In other business, the board voted to participate in an energy conservation program, subject to a review and approval by the county commission.
Under the program, the school system could apply for an interest free loan of up to $500,000 and contract with a company to make energy conservation retrofits to existing school buildings, such as heating, air conditioning, and lighting. The loan would be repaid over seven years from the savings in energy costs, due to those improvements. In order to participate, the school system would have to commit $9,500 to have the company prepare a detailed energy study to identify areas that need to be addressed. The costs could be paid for out of the energy savings to the school system.
The board voted to accept sealed bids to sell some surplus equipment including two 1995 Blue Bird buses, a 1994 John Deere 72 inch cut mower, and a Sanborn Blackmax 5 horsepower two stage 80 gallon tank air compressor with motor and compressor (needs to be overhauled). Bids will be opened at the next meeting on January 10th.
The board adopted a policy that authorizes the Director of Schools to obtain credit cards for business travel expense for general purpose and federal programs funds. Credit cards may only be used by authorized employees for legitimate school business expenditures. The issue of credit cards is not intended to circumvent the school system’s policies and procedures on purchasing.
Board Chairman W.J. (Dub) Evins recommended passage of the policy. ” We have a lot of programs that we send different members of the faculty to and they end up putting a lot of these charges on their personal credit cards so I’m recommending that we authorize the director of schools to apply for this credit card. These charges run into several thousands of dollars on personal credit cards and I think we, as a government body, need to get away from that. It will be the director’s responsibility and the credit cards will be maintained by him.”
The board also voted to make a DCHS course change for the spring semester 2008 by changing ‘Problems and Solutions in Technology 3813″ to “Technological Systems 3811″.
In a letter to the board, Brad Leach, Career and Technical Education Director at DCHS, wrote that ” This change is needed because a vast amount of competencies and standards for the “Problems and Solutions in Technology” course requires Internet access in order to be completed. The “Technology Systems” course does not require extensive amounts of research and Internet use to complete the competencies and standards.”
“Due to the limited use of Internet in our Career and Technical Education programs, additional standards and competencies in Career and Technical Education program area courses will be evaluated and additional course changes may occur in the future. The goal of the “Career and Technical Education” programs and the use of Perkins funding we receive is to provide the necessary equipment and technology to teach students the standards and competencies needed, improve, expand, and modernize quality career and technical education programs, including relevant technology, and to provide activities to prepare all students for high skill, high wage, or high demand occupations that will lead to self sufficiency.”
The board, as required by state law, will conduct the annual evaluation of the Director of Schools job performance on Tuesday, January 8th at 6:00 p.m. during an informal workshop. The results of the evaluation will be reported during the next regular meeting on Thursday, January 10th. A board self evaluation will be also be scheduled soon.