Danville School Board – LIVE! (7/2/15)

SouthsideCentral was LIVE! at the Danville Public Schools office for Thursday’s Danville School Board meeting. This article is now complete, so enjoy the recap.

Lori Cassada is showing Lisa Powell how to run the Big Board tonight.

Superintendent Stan Jones offers Kim Roberson $400 or what’s behind Curtain #1. Heh.

Wait, What? School Board Attorney Alan Spencer in the middle seat? Oh, that’s right… we have to elect a chairman tonight.

Alan Spencer calls the meeting to order.

We’re underway. This is the first meeting of the new school year. Dr. Stan Jones takes over as superintendent. Philip Campbell is the only board member out tonight. Ed Polhamus remains chairman, and Terri Hall is still vice-chairman after the annual reorganization vote. No one else was nominated. Lori Cassada is elected as board clerk, and Lisa Powell is elected deputy clerk. She’s taking Liz Jordan’s place. Liz is now the head of HR for Pittsylvania County.

Beverly Abbott speaks during the public comment section and wishes everyone the best on the new school year.

Beverly Abbott speaks in the public comment session, wishing the best for the coming year. I speak and give compliments for today’s response to the rumors that I wrote about earlier today.

Robin Owens tried to hide from the SouthsideCentral camera. She failed.

Yvette Smith & Robin Owens go over the changes to this year’s student code of conduct. Cyber-bullying is now mentioned as an offense directly. School Board attorney member Steven Gould detects a word that should be changed in a letter to parents. Cheryl Bryant talks about the new concussion policy that has to be changed due to new state laws.

Cheryl Bryant has that “teacher look”.

Guess who’s the only non-school employee here tonight? Dolores Reynolds, HELLO!

We heart Juliet Jennings.

Juliet Jennings talks about the personnel report and that’s approved. On to the administrative new hires, and Jerome Wilson is named assistant principal at Johnson Elementary. Robert Dalton is named assistant principal at Bonner Middle school. He comes from the Martinsville city school system.

Leon Ramsey looks way too serious here.

Leon Ramsey talks about the new roofs for Schoolfield & Westwood schools and new boilers for GW.

Now on to administrative things. The board members discuss their own code of conduct. Next, the board picks Chairman Ed Polhamus as their delegate for the Virginia School Board Association meeting and Vice-Chair Terri Hall as the alternate delegate. Stan Jones selects both Kathy Osborne & Juliet Jennings to share being his substitute if he can’t make a meeting. Kathy Osborne isn’t here tonight because she’s on vacation. Also, if Jones is unavailable, the board approved Kathy Osborne, Juliet Jennings & Yvette Smith to sign documents.

The talk moves to the upcoming planning session. Although the school board will be using the same people who helped in the superintendent search, they will be working independently under their own small businesses. Next comes where to have the planning session. Choices presented are the Institute, the Galileo cafeteria, or a church banquet hall. The cafeteria plan wins because it’s no additional cost.

Around the horn time. Board attorney Alan Spencer has nothing to say (again). Stan Jones talks about his first days on the job.All the board members say happy things about Jones and the upcoming school year. Happy one-year anniversary to board members Steven Gould & Sharon Dones!

Let’s see what everybody says in the around the horn segment!

Recess time, then the board goes into closed session. There’s one interesting thing that nobody is going to comment on, and that’s a pending lawsuit based on “student discipline”. I ask Ed Polhamus if the board will have any statement or action on that lawsuit, and he said “No, it’s still in the early stages.” Well, that’s it. We’re done here. Thanks for following along with SouthsideCentral!