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Board debate over athletic/activities director job description raises concerns about process and notice
Summary
Board members questioned the process used to adopt a TSBA model job description and to hire an athletic/activities director, citing limited advance notice to the director and board and concerns about the job’s scope and experience requirements.
Board members spent an extended portion of the meeting debating the job description and hiring process for a newly approved athletic/activities director position. The discussion focused on whether the board properly followed procedures, whether the director of schools had adequate notice, and whether the model job description required adjustments.
A board member representing District 5 said she had consulted Tammy at the Tennessee School Boards Association (TSBA) before proposing the model job description and expressed concern that board members and the director did not have time to review the proposal before the vote. She said the version the board approved appeared to include a broad set of duties — band, drama, activities and athletics — and questioned whether the required experience levels in the model matched the district’s expectations.
Mike Wynne, director of schools, told the board he had been informed and that the director (identified in discussion as Nick, the staff member overseeing activities scheduling) is handling master scheduling for gyms, the theater and fields and has been coordinating practice and facility use. Wynne and others described the new position as intended to reduce scheduling conflicts for principals and assistant principals.
Board members disagreed about process. One member said the job description should have come from the director or a designee rather than being presented as a model version that some members had not had time to study. Another member asked whether the district had altered the model from TSBA before adopting it; Wynne said it had not been altered and that the board approved the model version. A Board member also raised that the model’s experience requirement for a high-school role appeared inconsistent (one member said the model required eight years of high-school experience while the posted criteria allowed three).
The board discussed holding working sessions to review policies and job descriptions in advance of votes. Several members supported returning to working sessions so policy wording and job descriptions can be reviewed carefully before being placed on a consent or action agenda.
No reversal of the hiring or the job description occurred during the meeting. The board approved the model job description at a prior meeting; members asked for better pre-meeting distribution and for future work sessions to avoid similar conflicts.
