The Board responds to criticism of its decision to extend Dr. Hamlett

TL/DR

• Chairperson Dasi's comments on the Board's decision to extend Dr. Hamlett's contract claimed that this extension was not done earlier because all Board members were not present because of summer travel. At least one meeting in September and one in October featured the full board, contradicting Ms. Dasi's explanation. The meeting in which the superintendent's contract was extended, in contrast, did not feature the full board, as Dr. LaSerna was not present.

• Dr. Griffin has started a Substack page of his own, and on that page claims that the Board's evaluation of Dr. Hamlett and decisions regarding a contract extension for her were not completed until the 11/2/23 meeting, directly contradicting Ms. Dasi's explanation.

• Neither Ms. Dasi nor Dr. Griffin offered an explanation as to why the board withheld information until after the election, information that could potentially have affected that election, including re-election prospects for multiple board members.

Full Post

This won't be a long post.

There are two issues that deserve comment. The first is the Board of Education's decision to suspend written comments in the public record, and the second is the Board's attempts to explain the decision to extend Dr. Hamlett's contract. I will comment on the the suspension of written comments in another post, at a later date.

Tonight, however, I will be discussing the Board's attempts to explain and justify their decision to extend Dr. Hamlett.

As a refresher, the Board extended Dr. Hamlett by the maximum amount allowable under law, at the latest possible date allowable under law, mere days before an election in which a majority of the seats on the Board were up for election, and didn't announce that extension until two days after the election.

My post was shared on the Chapel Hill/ Carrboro Mothers Club on Facebook. Many people had responses to that particular post, as well as others I have previously written. I won't address those comments, except to say that many, many people jump to unwarranted conclusions.

In the comments on the Facebook post, Board Chair Rani Dasi offered the following explanation: "the superintendent evaluation was done some time ago. The contract discussion which usually happens around that same time was delayed because of board member travel during the summer."

Dr. George Griffin seems to have been inspired to start his own Substack account, which I applaud. I am obviously a fan of the format, and I think it is not an exaggeration to say I inspired him.

In one of his posts he had this to say about the contract extension:

"The board conducts an annual evaluation of the superintendent. This process typically occurs over a period of weeks to several months. The board also annually considers adjustments to the superintendent’s contract. The current board has completed this process twice in the past two years. There is a state law in NC that prohibits contract adjustments in the time period from when an election occurs and when new board members are sworn in. Knowing this, the board worked steadily to complete the evaluation and also modify the superintendent’s contract before the election date (November 7, 2023). In the evaluation, the Board recognizes that, although there is continued work to be done, Dr. Hamlett continues to leverage the strategic plan to address long-standing disparities in academic opportunities and outcomes, and to improve outcomes for all students in the district. Dr. Hamlett and the Board remain committed to working together with urgency to make consistent and measurable progress in these areas.

We actually completed the entire process in Closed Session at the regularly scheduled school board meeting held November 2, 2023. In order to formalize the contract modifications, we added approval of the contract to the agenda at the end of the meeting that night. Failure to do so could have jeopardized the entire process and contract unless a special board meeting was called prior to November 7, 2023."

I will note a couple of things about these two responses to my post.

The first is that neither Ms. Dasi nor Dr. Griffin addressed the fact that Dr. Hamlett's contract extension was not announced until after the election, despite occurring well before it. That is one of my chief complaints. It shows serious disregard for the democratic process, and it has not been addressed at all. Does anyone seriously think that the board would have waited until after the election to tout their decision if they thought it would help their electoral prospects?

The second thing to note is the discrepancies between these two explanations. According to Ms. Dasi, Dr. Hamlett's evaluation was completed during the summer, but no action was taken on her contract because board members were traveling and presumably the presence of the full board was needed. This is problematic for two reasons. The first is that, per publicly available minutes from the meetings, all board members were present for the meetings held on 9/21/23 and 10/19/23, both of which would be considered to have occurred well after "board member travel during the summer." The second reason Ms. Dasi's insinuation that the full board needed to be present to finalize contract discussions is problematic is that Dr. LaSerna was not present for the 11/2/23 meeting when the contract extension was finalized, again per the board minutes.

To recap, then, per Ms. Dasi, the board completed Dr. Hamlett's review in the summer, when it is supposed to have customarily been done, but neglected to finalize her contract review because not every board member could take part in the process, only to finalize her contract at the last possible minute but without one of the board members whose presence was required earlier in the summer.

Ms. Dasi did not mention Dr. LaSerna’s absence in her discussion of the extension on Facebook. It seems that would have been relevant.

Dr. Griffin's post, in contrast, suggests that the board completed the evaluation and the modifications on November 2, 2023, which the board knew was the last possible moment to push this through. They completed the whole process that night, not just the contract modifications. That seems to contradict Ms. Dasi's explanation, which is itself contradicted by publicly available minutes of board meetings.

Neither Dr. Griffin nor Ms. Dasi explain why it is appropriate to finalize an evaluation and push through contract extensions without the full board present.

Dr. Griffin also notes that the board "added approval of the contract to the agenda at the end of the meeting that night." In other words, there was no advance notice that this decision was even on the table, much less was going to be decided upon. I wonder what Dr. LaSerna thought of the decision of other board members to exclude her from the process it was so critically important to complete before the election.

It is extremely disappointing that the board believes it is acceptable to push through serious personnel decisions at the last possible minute, by their own admission trying to beat the clock and prevent incoming board members from making decisions about this process, and then hiding the existence of those decisions until disclosure could no longer hurt their electoral prospects. Frankly, it shows real disrespect for the democratic process itself and the voters who put them in those positions.