Madison Metropolitan School District human resources officials told the district operations work group on Jan. 13 that targeted pay adjustments, a substitute bonus program and revised recruiting practices have coincided with marked reductions in vacancies and turnover.

Jennifer Trendell, speaking for the Office of Human Resources, said the district hired a compensation analyst, completed salary audits and made salary adjustments; raised substitute pay and added a substitute bonus program; and shortened application timelines via improvements to the applicant tracking system and Cornerstone user experience. Trendell said the district has also increased social-media recruiting and community partnerships and planned a student-teacher recruitment event for summer 2025 to attract more candidates.

The district presented comparative figures showing a decline in teacher vacancies to 31.49 FTE from 87.5 FTE at the same point last year and a decline in SEA (student education assistant) vacancies to 14.8 from 46.42. Trendell credited those changes in part to the 2024–25 budget increases and said the district’s first-semester substitute fill rate is above 75 percent, up from about 50 percent the prior year.

Board members asked for more disaggregated data and for details about which positions qualified for salary adjustments. Trendell said salary adjustments this year included positions identified as student-services positions or those explicitly named in the handbook and that compensation decisions are informed by regional benchmarking and guidance documents created by HR. Angela Tesner, introduced as the HR operations director, reviewed leave options: eligibility for federal FMLA and Wisconsin FMLA requires specified service and hours thresholds; unpaid medical leave and short-term disability are available as described in the employee handbook.

Board members requested additional breakdowns — for example, staff demographics limited to teachers, counts of administrative leave, and disaggregated disability data if employees opt to disclose it — and pressed HR on whether application-sourcing survey questions are “select all that apply” or single-choice (Trendell said she would follow up). HR staff described several “grow your own” programs presented as retention levers: a 2+2 associate-to-bachelor pipeline, an SEA-to-special-education-cohort, and principal pipeline coaching; the first associate cohort had 19 participants and the district reports high rates of people-of-color participation.

The HR presenters emphasized that while some structural staffing gaps remain (HR reported 37 FTE in the department), improvements in salary competitiveness, substitute coverage and recruitment tools have reduced midyear disruptions and lowered overall turnover rates. Board members asked for continued updates and more teacher-specific demographic reporting.

Looking ahead, HR said it will continue to track licensing compliance, optimize Cornerstone training and to work toward reduced time-to-hire benchmarks.