The Crookston Public Schools’ Personnel/Negotiations Committee met on Friday morning in the District Office Conference Room in the Crookston High School to discuss two main items.
PERSONNEL COMMITTEE
The Personnel Committee met first to discuss their search for the next superintendent. Interim Superintendent Dave Kuehn said that he felt November would be the best time to begin searching for the next superintendent and discuss timelines after hearing suggestions from the Minnesota School Board Association. Kuehn reported that the Association has about five schools in the process right now, so beginning the search by January would be the best choice to find someone for next school year when many candidates will be available. “It’s something that most school districts if they know going in, that if they’re looking for a new Superintendent, they usually start that process in December,” Kuehn explained. “So, we put it on the forefront and discussed with our Personnel Committee about bringing some kind of recommendation to the November 28 meeting about the process and how we’re going to proceed with the next Superintendent for the Crookston School District.”
2023-24 Staffing Items
Dave Kuehn then began a discussion on staffing items, first discussing the new Middle School addition to the High School and how it will add some 6th-grade teachers to the High School. Kuehn explained that their main goal was to keep as many of the same teachers from Highland as possible. The other item was about what they would do for the principal of the Middle School. Kuehn explained that CHS Principal Matt Torgerson was currently at a National Middle School conference to learn more about the format of Middle Schools and staffing. Kuehn explained he was also trying to find the principal for the Middle School, and the district would have to decide how it would affect his job. “If the 6th grade comes up, we have three current sections of the grade. We have to decide how do we staff it at the High School, who will transition from Highland to the High School, and what subjects will they teach,” Kuehn explained. “Right now, the teachers at Highland are elementary teachers and teach all of the subjects within their class. When you get to the Middle and High School format, teachers teach by a subject area, so there are some changes in how staffing will look like. We also talked about the leadership position, in which we asked if we would get an assistant principal who would work alongside Matt, or a true Middle School Principal, where Matt would work with the 9-12 grades and this person would work with 6-8 grades.” Kuehn then mentioned that he believed the school’s COVID federal dollars the school had received for Learning Loss and Recovery, and they had spent much of it on after-school programs. The school still had a lot of the funds left that must be spent by September 2024, and Kuehn reported that they would use some of them to pay for some personnel this year and what’s left of it next year. Business Manager Laura Lyczewski mentioned that some of the after-school programs and the charges would have to be discussed at the school board meeting to figure out how to fund them to keep them running without the COVID fund dollars, as many students still used them this year.
NEGOTIATIONS COMMITTEE
The Negotiations Committee then met to discuss the current Memo of Understanding (MOU) for the 2023-24 School Year. Kuehn reported that he had met with the Crookston Education Association (CEA) and passed an understanding in August. They approved the latest retirement at the last School Board meeting in October. Tim Dufault said that the CEA was mainly looking for the specifications of the framework and process of the retirement and rehiring of staff. Kuehn reported that language would be added to the contract, which would replace the MOU with their contracts and would have to be an item they would negotiate with the next two-year agreement with the CEA. “I think it’s more about the communication and making sure that all of the parties involved, the district, the board, and the CEA, are communicating and going through this process together,” Kuehn explained. “I think we can definitely improve that process, and that created some questions that led to some minor changes to the language that’s in the current Memo of Understanding.” After much discussion, the board believed some changes could be added to the MOU and would bring them forward for further discussion with CEA.
The Crookston School Board will next meet on Monday, November 28, at 5:00 p.m. in the Crookston High School Choir/Orchestra Room.
