In the last Wrangell School Board meeting, on May 18, several members of the public voiced concerns with how things were running in the school district. Among them were concerns that the technology department was being cut at a bad time, as well as wider concerns that the district has a hostile work environment. The Wrangell Sentinel reached out to Superintendent Debbe Lancaster to seek a response to these concerns. Lancaster said that, after discussing the matter with School Board President Aaron Angerman, it would be more appropriate for him to address the public comments.
Angerman provided a written statement to the newspaper on Tuesday, May 26. In regards to concerns about the technology department, Angerman said that the district is trying to cut costs for budgetary reasons. The district is regularly seeing increases in their student population, as well, so they are having to do more with less. The decision to cut the tech department by 50 percent, from two people to one, was a difficult one for Dr. Lancaster to make. However, Angerman said he believes the district is positioned in a way they will be able to handle the cuts.
"Our tech department and Director Matt Gore have done an excellent job during the past months, not only launching virtual education to assist teachers during the pandemic, but in working to refresh student technology and technology infrastructure in our schools," Angerman wrote. "These additions should provide some breathing room for reduced staffing in the coming year."
In a technology report submitted to the school board in the May 18 meeting, Gore laid out the current state of affairs for technology in the school district. Wrangell Public Schools operate on three different platforms right now, he said: Mac, PC, and Chromebook. While challenging, he wrote, his department has succeeded in making all the platforms work together. There is a plan to "reset" next year. PCs will still be used in the district office and teachers will have the ability to use Macbooks, but students will be switching to iPads instead of Chromebooks. His report also included summaries of the plan to switch to iPads for students, putting together an option for senior students to purchase laptops from the district, a revitalization of the district website, and plans for a wider network update.
"With changes to budgeting and the inner workings of the school district, the technology department has been reduced by 50% from two technologists to one with the promise of a 4-hour technology assistant in the future," Gore's report reads.
Angerman also responded to concerns about the environment of the school district. In the last school board meeting, IT Coordinator Brittani Robbins said the school district has made efforts to ignore or suppress complaints from employees. She also said that district staff have made fun of her for medical conditions she has, and has had her travel and absenteeism for medical needs discussed by staff without her presence.
"Channels of voicing concerns and lodging formal complaints are in place and guided by policy and administrative regulation, including complaints regarding actions by the Superintendent," Angerman wrote. "Written complaints regarding the Superintendent are routed to the Board through the District Office Administrative Assistant [Kim Powell]. Since becoming a member of the WPSD School Board in October 2018, I have not seen any formal complaints pertaining to the Superintendent."
Angerman added, in a phone interview, that the school board would only see complaints about the superintendent. For example, if a teacher had a complaint about a principal, that complaint would be taken through proper channels to the superintendent. However, if the complaint is about the superintendent directly, it is in the district's administrative regulations that it must come to the board.
David Macri, former secondary school principal, also accused the district of having unethical and potentially illegal practices. He said the public needed to ask several questions, including why the district has "two of the possibly highest paid teachers in the United States" and how the schools' principal-teachers can enjoy the benefits of teaching and being part of the teacher's union, while also acting in the role of principal?
"Our District has highly qualified individuals leading our primary and secondary schools," Angerman wrote. "The Lead Teacher/Assistant Principal model has proven successful at the elementary school and I'm excited to see what it can do in the middle and high schools. These staff are paid in accordance with the negotiated agreement between Wrangell Public Schools and the Wrangell Teachers Association."
He further clarified that there is a difference between a principal and a lead teacher/assistant principal. The lead teachers still maintain their role as teachers for their schools, but they take on some of the responsibilities of a principal, too. They fulfill similar roles, he said, but they do not have the same level of authority as a principal. The teachers acting as "lead teacher/assistant principal" do not have the authority to sign off on evaluations or to give suspensions, for example, those are passed up to the superintendent. Angerman added that there is language in their negotiated agreements for extensions to their contracts both before and after the school year, for them to get the schools set up and later cleaned up.
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