School committee backs reorganization to prioritize elementary literacy and shift HR to business office
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Summary
The committee voted unanimously to support Superintendent Hackett's draft central-office reorganization, which retitles the assistant superintendent role to focus on elementary education, moves HR responsibilities to the business office under a finance & HR manager, repurposes an existing FTE, and creates a pre-K'12 data-analysis coordinator role.
The Winchester School Committee on Aug. 8 unanimously supported a central-office reorganization proposed by Superintendent Dr. Frank Hackett intended to free capacity for elementary-literacy work and improve district operations.
The plan removes personnel/HR duties from the current assistant superintendent position to make that role principally the assistant superintendent for elementary education and shifts HR responsibilities into the business office under Michelle Kingdon, whose position will be restructured from accounting manager to finance & HR manager. Hackett said the changes are accomplished by repurposing an existing, budgeted FTE rather than adding new funded staff for FY25 and that there is "no cost impact with this leadership change." He told the committee the plan also includes title changes (payroll specialist to payroll coordinator, accounting specialist to accounting coordinator, HR specialist to HR coordinator) and creation of an accounting & HR specialist role to provide redundancy in payroll and human-resources processes.
The superintendent described a broader redistribution of responsibilities: elementary content coordinators will report to the assistant superintendent for elementary education, the director of nursing will be aligned under that same position, and literacy specialists/coaches will be building-based reports to principals while the district's literacy-curriculum process proceeds. Hackett also said the district will add a pre-K'12 data-analysis coordinator to support Analytic View rollout and multi-measure student and system dashboards.
Committee members asked whether the vote approved a final plan or signaled support to begin implementation with possible tweaks; Hackett said responsibilities are final but job titles and some details may be adjusted as implementation proceeds. The committee voted its support to proceed with the structural changes.
Next steps: staff will begin transitions and training to effect the reorganization and will continue to evaluate structures during the FY26 budget process.