By CHARLENE PAUL
Moapa Valley Progress
Emergency meetings of the School Organization Teams (SOTs) from Moapa Valley High School (MVHS) and W. Mack Lyon Middle School (LMS) were held last week in response to an announcement that both schools would be losing their deans. The announcement was made the week before by CCSD Superintendent Jesus Jara. The announcement declared that all 170 dean positions in the district’s high schools and middle schools would be eliminated.
Of course, SOT members were concerned about safety at local schools when the dean position, usually the one in charge of school discipline, is eliminated.
“As a SOT, we are concerned about the safety of our students,” said Terry Holzer SOT member at MVHS. “MVHS is an open campus, making it imperative that we have a dean to take care of the discipline and safety issues that arise. Without Dr. Lake, our dean, we have to explore options on how to keep our kids safe.”
But safety was not the only concern of the local SOT members. Many were concerned that Dr. Jara’s actions were in violation of state law. Nevada Revised Statutes passed in 2015 require a decentralization of the decision-making process and budget concerns.
The law requires that the CCSD superintendent transfer to each local school the responsibility to select teachers, administrators and other staff working under the supervision of the principal.
“The problem is CCSD has violated the law since it passed,” said Holzer. “The decision Jara made actually belongs to the school precincts.”
Both the middle school and the high school SOTs drafted letters to Jara and the CCSD School Board of Trustees last week. The letters explained the two SOTs’ belief that “cutting the Dean position undermines and minimizes our SOT’s roles and responsibilities, and takes the first step back towards re-centralization.”
“Nevada specifically legislated against this in 2017,” the letters state. “The Superintendent has every right to adjust the local school precinct’s budgets based on the District’s financial abilities, but not to determine staffing within a precinct.”
Lyon Middle School SOT member Lindsey Dalley pointed out that if the CCSD budget deficit had been spread out evenly and fairly over the entire district, each SOT and principal would have only had to cut approximately $12,000-$15,000 from their yearly operating budget. That cost would be much less than the approximately $84,000 associated with a dean position, Dalley said.
“It all goes back to the years of effort to de-centralize the decision-making and budgeting process,” Dalley said. “The real concern here is an over-reach by the district and an undermining of the de-centralization process.”
Some may wonder why the Mack Lyon Middle School SOT took a stand in this situation since the decision to eliminate the dean position didn’t affect them. LMS dean Aimee Lewis was promoted to the position of Assistant Principal at the school just before the change was announced. Lyon SOT President Aimee Houghtalen said that it was a question of fairness.
“The deficit was not just the responsibility of the high schools and middle schools,” Houghtalen said. “By spreading it out over the entire district, the impact on each school’s budget would be minimized, and would still allow the SOTs and the principals to make the decision on how it would impact their budget concerns.”
