School board to try out committees

Breaking up may be hard to do, but the St. Charles school board's going to give it a shot.

Members agreed this week to split into four committees that will individually tackle issues related to finance, policy, instruction and community relations.

The committees -- consisting of two board members and a district administrator -- will meet as needed, while the full board will scale back its regular schedule from two meetings a month to one.

The goal is to give officials more time away from the table to make "in-depth" studies of issues before taking recommendations to the full board, Superintendent Donald Schlomann said.

All decisions still will need support from the majority of the school board.

"The objective here, quite frankly, is to have more input on these issues," Schlomann told the board Monday. "We can always go back to the two meetings a month, but let's give this a shot."

Board President Kathy Hewell is expected to assign members to each of the four committees in September.

Some will serve on more than one committee, and Hewell's position as president would preclude her from serving on any of them.

The public also might be asked to fill advisory roles on the panels once they are up and running, officials said.

Schlomann proposed four groups with "very broad" missions: a business services committee to oversee finance, buildings and grounds, transportation and food services; a policy committee to maintain all district policies; a learning and teaching committee to review and renew curriculum and textbooks; and a community relations committee tasked with engaging the public in decision-making.

Schlomann said the structure should save time previously spent wrangling over issues at regular meetings. All seven board members voiced support for the plan.

"It makes sense to me to try and create a different model when our existing one has made for hours and hours and hours of meetings without resolution," member Lori Linkimer said.

"If it saves us time and moves the district forward, I have no problems at all," board Vice President Jim Gaffney said.

Once the committee structure is in place next month, the board will meet only on the second Monday of each month. Meetings are at 7 p.m. at district headquarters, 201 S. Seventh St.