Parents, Trustee Object To Process Used To Hire New Cda Principals

Parents and the school board chairman objected to the way that two new principals were hired for the Coeur d’Alene elementary schools Monday night.

“Neither our young people, taxpayers or new hires were served by that process,” said Chairman Ken Burchell after the principals were approved by the board.

Board member Tim Olson disagreed, saying the administration did a thorough job in choosing the best candidates.

Burchell objected to the fact that the board did not interview any of the candidates for the positions at Dalton and Borah elementary schools. That job was left up to committees at each school and the central office.

Some parents in attendance whole-heartedly agreed with Burchell, and left the meeting disappointed at the lack of debate over the staff recommendations.

“What concerns me is they will spend 20 minutes discussing minutiae in the policy manual, but they won’t spend 40 minutes interviewing a candidate who will be with the district 15 years and impacting the lives of thousands of students,” said parent Jeannette Stavish, as she gathered with a handful of parents outside the district office.

Burchell and board member Jane Curtis voted against hiring Joel Palmer as principal of Borah Elementary. The board was unanimous on the choice of Linda Powers as principal of Dalton Elementary, however.

Palmer was an elementary teacher and most recently directed the district’s federally funded Chapter 1 instructional program. Powers ran the district’s preschool program.

Parent Eileen Cox, who sat on one of the hiring committees, said she preferred a candidate outside the district over Palmer.

“The problem was, they were more comfortable interviewing people they know,” she said. The committee included teachers and parents.

In other business:

The board heard a report of the success of multi-age classrooms. The administration will ask that they be allowed to expand the number of classrooms that combine 1st- and 2nd-grade students.

The staff presented a draft policy for using computer networks at school that sets strict rules and places the responsibility for following them on students and their parents.

, DataTimes