HR report: Jamestown schools cite communication, workload and morale as top retention challenges

Jamestown Public Schools’ human resources team told the school board June 1 that exit interviews show the district is retaining more staff than last year but must address recurring concerns about communication, workload, morale and, to a lesser extent, compensation.

Stacy Jamgard, HR generalist, told the board that departures fell from 20 teachers last year to 15 this year and that her exit-interview process combined SurveyMonkey responses with in-person follow-ups to raise the completion rate to about 67 percent. "Exit interviews are just one of the tools that we use to better understand employee experiences and identify opportunities for retention," Jamgard said.

Jamgard said the most common exit reason listed was “resignation” without further detail; retirements accounted for about 16 percent of departures. She said employees consistently cited student relationships, mentorship and the district’s benefit package as strengths.

But Jamgard highlighted repeat areas for improvement: "District communication has always been our number one area that people mentioned that we could work on improving," she told the board. Workload and building morale also appeared frequently in responses, and compensation re-emerged this year as a concern that some staff raised.

Her recommendations included increased, regular communication from the district (Jamgard suggested a monthly newsletter), targeted communication training for building administrators, more public recognition of staff accomplishments and launching "stay interviews" — structured conversations with current employees to learn what keeps them in the district.

Board members welcomed the findings and the recommendations. Aaron Roberts and other members said more communication and training should be folded into strategic-planning discussions; one member suggested prioritizing stay interviews for special-education staff, an area Jamgard identified as a retention pressure point.

The report did not include a breakdown of all exit reasons by position beyond what Jamgard summarized; she said some categories (for example, office and food-service staff) are harder to reach for follow-up and that involuntary terminations typically do not complete exit interviews.

The board did not take formal action on the report but directed staff to include retention-related items in upcoming strategic-plan discussions and implementation steps.

The next related step noted was the district’s strategic-plan committee meeting on June 4, where board members said they would consider tactics to address the communication, workload and morale issues Jamgard raised.