The Columbia County Board of Education’s monthly Work Session on Tuesday evening saw discussions of strategic waiver contracts, noncertified staffing and education bills passed through the Georgia Senate.
Amid recent controversies concerning the perceived encroachment of critical race theory concepts in school curriculum and parents’ ability to monitor what materials are available in school libraries and classrooms, Superintendent Steven Flynt brought up before the board the Georgia House Bills 1084, which says that school “training programs shall not act upon, promote, or encourage divisive concepts” but shall not “prohibit a local board of education or local school system from promoting concepts such as tolerance, mutual respect, cultural sensitivity, or cultural competency”; and Senate Bill 449, which includes what is called the “Parents’ Bill of Rights.”
“Obviously we’ve been working on this because we’ve been working on policies and procedures here that currently deal with that,” said Flynt. “I anticipate that our policies will need to be drafted in accordance with these bills once they’re signed by the governor, and I look forward to us doing that complying with what state policy will be once the legislature and the governor signed that bill.”
Chief Human Resources Officer Tony Wright noted that the district is at 99% fill rate of all its allocated certified positions, with last minute vacancies likely to be filled by retirees or substitutes hired last year. Noncertified, however, is at 93%, and the district has 79 vacancies overall, which Wright said was lower than what is usually expected around this time of year.
Wright also noted that some noncertified staff is leaving due to salary, and even spoke to transportation workers about why they’re leaving.
“I think we’ve got some strategies we can put in place to work on that, but yes, salary is an issue,” said Wright before the board. “Money’s not the only thing; there are other things we can fix.”
Assistant superintendents Kellye Bosch and Steven Cummings spoke to the board about the Columbia County School District Leadership Program, established in 2019 to “recruit, employ, develop and retain quality leaders” in the district.
The initiative consists of four programs, facilitated by members of the superintendent cabinet: teacher leader, aspiring leader, aspiring principal and new principal induction. Cummings mentioned that 173 teachers and administrators have participated in the program.
The board voted to approve the fourth amendment to the school district’s strategic waiver contract. When a district is a strategic waiver school system, it enters a contract with the State Board of Education to receive waivers from certain state laws and rules in exchange for being held to a higher standard of accountability. Associate superintendent Michele Sherman noted that 132 of Georgia’s school systems participate to receive these flexibility options.
The Columbia County School District first entered into this contract in 2015 and has amended its contract three times since then, being allowed to revisit the agreement each year.
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering education in Columbia County and business-related topics for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
