Trustees seek more active role

An ECISD “fine-tuning” task force has set out to identify a means for trustees to become more engaged in the governing process of the Ector County Independent School District.

With the help of a paid consultant, the task force has determined the board is “underutilized” as a resource and “underinvolved” in several key governing areas in the school district due to an inadequate board structure.

“The board would like to take a more active role in the operations of the school district, which means we need to become more involved earlier in things that are taking place,” Board President Tom Pace said. “Many times, information is brought to us in a board meeting where the staff has done all the reasearch. We’re presented a finished product and, at that time, we can either approve or disapprove and most of the time we approve.”

“When they’re still developing the product, we’d like to be involved in it,” Pace added. “It’ll be a much faster process.”

Pace said the task force will likely recommend the creation of three or four subcommittees at a meeting sometime next month. Among other things, the subcommittees will enable trustees to play a more active role in researching important decisions, such as whether the school district should switch from a junior high system to a middle school system, Pace said.  He added a committee may look at the third high school concept as well.

“We want to have a more satisfying experience as a board,” board member Fay Batch, who serves on the task force, told trustees on Tuesday. “We don’t want to be considered a rubberstamp board anymore, so we will be continually fine-tuning the board’s governing processes.”

The school district has hired Doug Eadie, a Florida consultant who helps nonprofit and public organizations build “higher-impact” governing bodies. On Tuesday, Eadie led a four-hour workshop in which trustees and school administrators viewed multiple presentations and, after dividing into small groups, brainstormed ideas on how to work better as a team.

ECISD communications director Mike Adkins said the project cost about $26,000 altogether.

Pace stressed that board trustees intend to comply with all open meeting laws with the formation of the subcommittees.

“There’s not anything in any of this that’s every going to override the state law on opening meetings,” said Mike Atkins, the school district’s attorney. “Anytime there’s a meeting of four members or more, it will be subject to the open meetings act.”