SHAWANO, WI- The Shawano School Board has a new leader, and his focus is on fixing the district.
“We have a broken system and I need to lead a charge to bring us all back together.”
School Board President Mike Musloff says right now the district has teachers, students and community members who are not happy with the board and the Superintendent, and says teacher retention is a very high priority for him as school board president. He said many of the teachers that have retired or have decided to move on are taking many years of experience with them.
“It is driving me insane that they are leaving.”
According to meeting minutes, 22 staff members have resigned or retired from the district since September. “We are losing a lot of staff that are helping form our kids into young adults, and replacing staff that we have lost is going to be difficult, if not impossible,” he said. “I can’t promise that is going to be better right away, but I am going to do everything in my power.”
He said one example of showing the willingness to listen was voting for professional staff and support staff to get a 4.7 percent raise during Monday’s meeting. Musloff ended up being the deciding vote as the motion passed 4-3. “Fiscally, that was totally the wrong decision, totally, but as far as our hearts go, we had to do it and we will have to figure out where that future funding is coming from.” During that vote, board members Jim Davel, Michael Sleeper and Chuck Dallas voted against the raise, saying he district did not have the money to do it. Jamie Beyer, Jeana Winslow, Mart Grams and Musloff voted yes with Chris Gull abstaining and one board member being absent.
One of the concerns that the community has expressed is the amount of money that has been spent in Central Office. In the past two years, multiple consultants have been hired to help fix issues that the district does not have the expertise for.
“All situations where we spend money are going to have to be reviewed annually and one of those situations is hiring consultants.” Musloff said as a board, they agreed that the district had deficiencies that needed to be addressed and that is why they hired consultants. “At some point we have to say that we have had our time with the consultants and we should have been able to fix what we needed to and move forward.” He said some decisions will have to be made on the consultants and a significant number of dollars have been spent in the district on hiring consultants.
One of the consultants hired was a consultant to help better technology. “I did not know that the technology was not going to jive and would cause so many problems, but it needs to be fixed and I hear the frustrations that the staff and kids are having.” He said the decision that was made was not a good one. “We are not going to sit here and say we have to deal with, not under my watch, that’s not going to happen,” he declared. “How we are going to do that, I am not sure, but we need to make things easier for our staff and our kids.”
The new technology that was implemented by Vicki Lyons has been under a lot of criticism from the community, staff and students, because technology has gotten such a negative response in the past two school years. According to a study that was conducted in 2016 by Springsted, 87 percent of the staff listed technology as one of the greatest areas of satisfaction in the district. In a recent study conducted by SEA, 2022, the new technology rollout received an average score of 1.8 on a scale of 1-5 with 1 being the lowest score. “I don’t think the technology is where is needs to be right now because if things are not going to work the way it is supposed to work, we need to come up with a different plan.” He says he also wants to hear more from the staff on what they want and what works for them since they use it on a regular basis. “If we are having budget issues, why are we spending money on things that we don’t need to survive, we need to take a step back and make a decision on what needs to go and what needs to stay and maybe reevaluate in a few years when we are more fiscally sound again.”
Musloff said he plans on looking at the effectiveness of the consultants that have been hired.
“There is a place for consultants and at some point we need to say thank you, but we are moving on now.” Superintendent Randi Anderson said on multiple occasions that consultants are working to work themselves out of a job, but hiring records show that that has not been happening.
Musloff says he also wants to look into if it is possible for the board members to get access to exit interviews, especially if the content could be considered a complaint that should go to the board. At past meetings, board member Mart Grams has asked to see exit interviews for staff members who have retired early or resigned, but has been told the board is not able to see that. Musloff said he wants to look into that more.
Musloff addressed his first two years on the board and said he put a lot of blind trust in what was being recommended by the superintendent and administration, and voted accordingly. “The community sees us as a board who votes the same way and listens to what the superintendent says and casts their votes from that,” Musloff said. “I am embarrassed to say that I became complacent and I take full responsibility for not reaching out to the community or staff, but that will change.”Musloff says he plans to have staff have an opportunity to get a hold of him before a board meeting to give him their thoughts. “The same goes for the community, if you have a concern, shoot me a text and let me know if you have an issue with an item on the agenda,” he explained. “Give me a solution, give another idea or tell me your thoughts, and that way I can go the board meeting and open up the discussion.”
Along with that, he says he will be getting issues that the community has on agendas. He added that he was concerned about the limitation of community comment two meetings ago when past president Michael Sleeper prevented some people from speaking during public comment if he felt the topic was individualized or repetitive of a comment from earlier.
“Our community will be able to comment at the meetings, but you need to make sure that it is not an individualized comment because it is against our policy, but if you have a complaint about a board member or the superintendent, you should let me know and if their are allegations for complaints, I will look into them. I personally am not for censoring anyone that is talking at the board meetings. I will not be limiting comments, I just ask that the community follows the rules and I plan on making sure that the board listens.” He said if people bring up an issue during community comments, he will see what he can do to make sure it gets on an agenda for future discussion as long as it makes sense to have it on an agenda or as long as it is feasibly possible.
Musloff also addressed the talk of the community recalling board members. He says that is in the right of the community to do so if they feel the board members are not doing their job. “Give me a chance to try to right this ship first and lets see how this goes for awhile and if it is still not working, by all means, the community can evaluate that make that decision.
The vote for president last Monday showed a split in the board, with Musloff defeating former President Michael Sleeper 6-3 in a secret ballot. He says he hopes the three that did not vote for him will get on board with his vision. “The direction we are going to go will be more open and more communication. That is my path and I will not be talked out of going down that path, so if someone does not want to be on that page, I don’t know what to tell them because that is the path that we are going to go down.” In the same breath, Musloff said overall, he feels this board will be the right team for the job.
“At some point, it is going to be great again. It is going to be great, it is going to flourish and Shawano will be proud.”
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