The Shadow
Subcommittees were the latest idea discussed by the Joint School Services Committee during a meeting held Thursday night at the Jackson River Technical Center.
The mention of subcommittees first took place during last Thursday’s meeting in lieu of other possible issues that may arise during the process of creating a merged school system between Covington City and Alleghany County public schools.
Joint School Services Committee Chairman Jacob Wright mentioned that the first subcommittee category should deal with capital improvements of potential properties that might be used in a proposed merged system.
Wright felt that if a group was formed to deal with that issue, a great measure of building usage going forward would be obtained.
Before the forming of more subcommittees took place, Covington Mayor and Joint School Services Committee member Tom Sibold then expressed some thoughts on the topic.
“One of the things that happened when this group first started, we decided that the three issues that were sticking us up the last time is what we would try to resolve — the governance, the funding and salary equalization,” Sibold said.
He continued, “It was my impression that we were going to, as a group, work on these three things.”
Sibold then stressed that he and his fellow committee members have been receiving questions from the public on matters that the committee has never discussed or intended to work on up to this point.
“We get questions about all kinds of stuff that we never intended to work on at this point. So, my idea with subcommittees was to start branching out and working on some of those things,” Sibold said.
Sibold then stated that somewhere along the line, there are other things that will need to be addressed, such as curriculum, that he feels that he or his fellow committee members are not experts on.
“This group, we’re not experts on anything. You need to bring some people in the conversation that have more knowledge on what we need to talk about,” Sibold told his fellow committee members.
Joint School Services Committee Vice Chairman Jonathan Arritt agreed with Sibold’s sentiments.
“Setting up subcommittees with our superintendents [Melinda Snead-Johnson and Eugene Kotulka] and appropriate central office staff with curriculum and those sorts of matters is entirely necessary,” Arritt stated.
At the conclusion of the subcommittee discussion, it was determined by the committee that subcommittee formation would be tabled until the Thursday, Dec. 19, meeting has taken place.
Several presentations will take place at this meeting which will give the committee more information as it moves forward.
That meeting scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 19, will take place at a time and location to be announced at the beginning of next week.
It was also announced Thursday night that another meeting following the one on Dec. 19, will take place at a time, date and location to be determined, in which public comment and discussion will be allowed with the committee.
