A proposed change in the New Hanover County Board of Education’s meeting schedule could allow members to dig deeper into upcoming issues while trimming time from regularly scheduled meetings on the first Tuesday of each month.
Newcomer to the board Bruce Shell, who previously served as New Hanover County Manager before retiring in 2012, suggested the board meet informally to discuss each monthly agenda before the regular meeting, an exercise also practiced by New Hanover County Commissioners. The school board’s policy committee discussed the change during a Feb. 10 meeting.
“I like the thought of having those informal meetings. You can ask questions you need to ask. It’s more intimate. You learn more,” Shell said. “And my experience with that is it speeds up the Tuesday night event, oftentimes, and it takes away some of the ambiguity sometimes generated by questions on meeting night.”
Superintendent Dr. Tim Markley said the board will likely hear presentations about items that require a vote at the next meeting during the review and leave informational presentations from staff, teachers and school administrators a slot during the regular meetings. The board will not vote or take action during agenda reviews, he noted.
No time or location is listed in the updated policy, but the reviews will likely be held at the New Hanover County Schools Administration Building on Carolina Beach Road at 4 p.m. on Thursdays before each monthly meeting. If the policy change passes first and second readings by the full board with no snags, the board will meet for its first agenda review in July, Markley said.
The change will come before the school board during a March 3 meeting, when the board will also select a name for the new, bond-funded elementary school in the Porters Neck area, scheduled to begin construction later this year and open its doors for the 2017-18 school year.
The school board welcomed public recommendations for the school’s name, many of which fell under the category of local community members or characteristics of the school’s geographic location, Markley said.
To whittle down the list, the board determined during the Feb. 10 meeting it preferred to name the school after the area, not a person. If the board opted to name the school after a person, it would likely have to develop criteria to quantify each person’s contribution to the community as justification, said board member Tammy Covil. Chairman Don Hayes said in recent years the board has moved away from naming schools after people.
Based on board consensus, Markley will share the list of geography-based name suggestions with board members, who were encouraged to think about it until the March meeting.
email [email protected]
