At the May Pine Bluff School District Board Meeting, I requested as a concerned PBSD stakeholder, to have public comments and was never allowed to.
We as concerned PBSD stakeholders have circulated a Vote of No Confidence petition in Superintendent Jennifer Barbaree that expresses our disapproval in the newly hired state superintendent by the state-appointed limited board.
In an attempt to communicate our Vote of No Confidence, it was arbitrarily and capriciously decided that no public comments would be made at the May board meeting and a policy would be created to limit our free speech.
We have expressed our no confidence in Superintendent Barbaree for the following reasons and others:
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
She promoted a school millage during state authority without being transparent with the community that district millage funds could go to charter school management or Watson Chapel under the LEARNS legislation and funds can only go toward the building of academic buildings.
She promoted the furtherance of the appointed limited board with staggered elections despite AR Act 633 dictating that PBSD should have an elected board in a single election after return to local control.
Her hiring as superintendent was done without advertising the position according to PBSD district policy, yet she advertised and replaced four of the seven principal administrators and four of the seven assistant principals. We feel that camouflages her inability to effectively evaluate and to build capacity of current PB residents employed as building administrators. Also, the appointed limited board does not have the authority to hire or fire the superintendent.
Failure to make sound decisions. She failed to place the ninth-grade students at the high school where the hiring of teachers would minimize teaching staffing challenges. She hired and paid a provider $170,000 for inoperable phone lines and cellphones. She failed to renew certified teachers for the upcoming year resulting in the loss of certified teachers, which will impact student achievement. She did not secure three bids before recommending purchases.
She allowed PBSD liability insurance to expire. Did she pursue three bids or just accept the increase in premium?
She failed to address the academic decline of the district by placing inexperienced leadership in our buildings and not making sure the ATLAS test bank was fully operational in the district to create formative assessments prior to ATLAS summative assessments. That situation could contribute to another state takeover because students are not being successful on their summative assessments due to inadequate preparation.
There was a lack of transparency when limited board member Dr. Stephen Broughton was replaced without allowing all interested PBSD stakeholders to express interest in being a replacement appointed board member.
We feel that the PBSD is constantly being denied our rights as a fully local controlled taxpaying school district with a state appointed limited board that hired a state appointed superintendent for the next three years.