A Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools board with a majority of new members decided at their first meeting Tuesday to stick with a familiar leader, unanimously electing current chairperson Elyse Dashew to another term.
Three incumbents were voted out in November and two didn’t run. Between the election and Tuesday’s meeting, there was lots of jockeying for leadership and talk about the voters wanting change.
But when it came time to raise hands for board chair, all nine members chose Dashew to continue for a fourth year. That was followed by a unanimous vote for Stephanie Sneed, the new representative for the eastern District 4, as vice chair.
During the campaign Sneed emphasized the dire problems facing CMS. But during her first meeting she struck a different tone.
“My hope in CMS is everlasting,” she said. “I look forward to working with all of the colleagues that are sitting here and to be a part of making CMS the best in the nation.”
Dashew said the new members bring “fresh energy and fresh ideas that we’ve been needing.”
“Outside these meeting chambers, in the political world, it is very toxic right now. It’s just about as toxic as I’ve ever seen it,” she said. “And inside this sanctuary, where we’re doing this work, I see the potential for us to work together in a harmony that I haven’t seen in a long time.”
The public portion of the meeting lasted just over four and a half hours and gave a sense of the massive work facing the board. It included:
- A report on grim reading scores for Latino third-graders and the district’s efforts to bring those scores up in the next two years.
- Staff plans to revise busing options for some magnet high schools in an effort to save money, deal with driver shortages and decrease the length of time students spend in transit.
- The announcement of five principal reassignments to prepare for the opening of new schools in August.
- A report on public engagement efforts to determine what people want in their next superintendent. Earnest Winston was fired from the job in April, and Hugh Hattabaugh, who signed a 14-month contract as interim, is leaving this week to return to Florida.
About 10:45 p.m. the board went into closed session to discuss who will fill the interim post. North Carolina’s open meetings law allows members to meet privately to discuss personnel matters and consult with attorneys. They adjourned shortly after midnight with no action, which means they’ll have to call a special meeting to name an interim in the next couple weeks.
WFAE senior editor Ely Portillo contributed to this report.
