Heyworth’s April School Board meeting was back in room 310, a room that might hold 20 people when set up for board meetings. Contrast that with last months two meetings, one regular and one special, that filled up at least one quarter of the gymnasium. Those crowds came out for those board meetings after inappropriate books were found in Sarah Bonner’s classroom and inappropriate references to materials she posted were found on the schools website.
Bonner resigned involuntarily.
Wednesday night’s meeting was a time for new beginnings. New board members were seated and new officer’s elected. Recently reelected former board secretary Kelli Rewerts was elected the new board president. Former president Justin Johnson did not run for reelection to the school board.
Superintendent Lisa Taylor said typical board meetings have small attendance but there are a lot of ways to get the information on line while acknowledging that crowds do get larger when something has gained a lot of attention on social media or in the community.
Taylor noted that the Bonner resignation happened three weeks ago and that the next week was spring break so students and staff have only been in school two weeks since the week of turmoil that resulted from the books found in Bonner’s room and and references online.
“What we have really started doing is just forming our committees on some of the things we talked about with the school board in terms of let’s just review all of our policies and procedures,” Taylor said. “And we don’t need to rush into anything immediately but we need to do it correctly. And so we will be looking at classroom libraries, having teachers weigh in on what processes should we have in place, what’s working, what’s not and then likely bringing recommendations back to the board before the start of next school year.”
According to Taylor the board has a process regarding any book at the school where interested persons can object to a book. The matter then goes to a committee for review. The committee’s ruling can be appealed all the way to the school board. Typically the school offers an alternative option regarding a book that can be used in lieu of the book objected to and the problem can be worked out.
Parents can find out what books are in the classroom and in the library by using the library directory online. They can also review what students have checked out.
Coincidentally Taylor reported to the board changes that are necessary due to new state laws regarding employees accused of sexual misconduct.
“The Illinois Association of School Boards puts out a policy manual and they update sections of that, Taylor said. “And so they recommend through their legal staff policy changes that districts should make. So tonight we were just reviewing those and then we will approve next time.”
Employers are now required to do a history review which means when hiring they have to contact each previous employer where the candidate worked with children to see if there were any accusations or findings of sexual misconduct. Heyworth will be upgrading their system so it can do that instead of having a person dry calling and playing phone tag. The district will not be able to hire without going through this procedure. The rule applies to people in and beyond the classroom.
