Updates to watch for with the Park City School District

Hi, I’m Josh Mann, and I’m running for Park City School Board. You may have received a ballot this week in the mail. If so, I would appreciate your consideration.

It’s been interesting running for School Board. I am receiving a remarkable amount of emails related to people’s concerns with the school district. The communication is coming from staff members, teachers, and people who are afraid to tell me who they are for fear they will receive retribution from the school district. To be fair, most of the communication is hard to verify, since I’m currently not on the school board. However, I have been doing this long enough to generally recognize real concerns.

There are real concerns.

I wanted to bring those to your attention, so our community can have a discission about what I am hearing. Here are the details:

• I have received information about class sizes next year at many of our elementary schools. As teachers are leaving, sections of non-DLI classes are planning on being combined. There are two fears. First, there is a concern that the superintendent isn’t committed to keeping elementary class sizes in the mid-twenty student range. Second, even if the superintendent wants to keep class sizes low, the district’s willingness to wait until August to fill positions may make it virtually impossible to hire quality teachers.
• There appears to be an exodus of school employees coming this summer. From all accounts, this includes both teachers and other staff members — each of which fills vital roles in our schools. This will have an impact on education next year.
• The district is hiring a new principal for Trailside Elementary School (TSES). Some community members are concerned that Dr. Gildea will not follow the search committee’s recommendation to hire a specific, experienced professional from within the Park City School District. Instead, they believe she will go with her pick who appears to have less experience. A similar process is reported to have happened before at TSES and led to a suboptimal outcome.
• Many of us have been focused on the school bond that was approved and the lease revenue bonds that will provide over $120 million to make improvements to our schools. However, I am hearing from teachers and community members who are questioning whether the implementation of the Master Plan, the plan that guides the use of the money, will be conducive to our teachers and children. One example is Jeremy Ranch Elementary. The area that is currently the blacktop playground is scheduled to become a bus turnaround. The worry is that the money for rebuilding the playground and the plans for moving the playground have not been finalized. That’s especially concerning with construction starting soon. That may seem minor, but it will impact 500 children this fall. There are many decisions like that which will likely impact our 4,600 students and hundreds of teachers over the coming year or two. There is a feeling those haven’t been handled well.
• I’ve heard that the school district’s diversity, equity, and inclusion committee was disbanded earlier this year due to frustration from members due to the school district’s actions. They were trying to find ways to help our schools’ most vulnerable students but ran into roadblocks. I’ve also heard the Superintendent was trying to claim that the committee was successful, even though it wasn’t. I’ve heard of no success. All I’ve heard from the Superintendent is that we need to hire a district office person to be responsible for DEI. It seems more of the same. There appears to be a belief that central administration solves all problems. However, if our best and brightest couldn’t solve the issues over many years and the committee disbanded due to frustration, then I am very worried. Less than 25% of our underserved students are proficient in Math and English. We are 4.3% worse tha the state average in helping economically disadvabtaged and minority students. It’s uncceptable.

I’d love to promise that I could solve all of our problems, but that’s not realistic. What’s needed is a change of culture and a change of school board leadership. Fundamentally, we need the public to trust our school district again. Trust is made up of a thousand little actions that make people feel comfortable. Our school district is far from that.

What I promise is that I will work every day to support our children, teachers and tax payers. I will listen and use your input to make the best decisions I can.