Social Justice and Equity Committee
Minutes of the June 20, 2024 Regular Meeting (via Zoom)
Committee members attending: Eva Nolan (chair), Deborah Stanford, Tim Maciel
Others attending: Mikaela Simms, Michael Kelliher, Deborah’s statistics on retention and reasons for leaving one school for another were discussed.
An email was sent to highlight issues with retention, including retirement, resignation, and reasons for leaving. The focus is on analyzing the factors contributing to and impacting retention. Mikaela is examining the reasons for employee turnover and the positions that people are leaving.
Michael mentioned that our school’s turnover rate is lower than the state average. The state turnover rate is 30%, while ours is approximately 12%. In Massachusetts, the teacher turnover rate is 12%. There have been several retirements. Additionally, 26 responses out of 57 were received from the exit interview survey. Tim raised a concern about the old exit interview data and inquired about its availability from the past. This serves as a reminder to the board to follow up on this matter. Michael Kellier explained that the old exit interview format used to be paper-based and manually entered, which was cumbersome. The new format, with approximately 17 questions and a couple of essay questions, has helped improve the process. Around 50% of the exit interview forms are completed by the personnel. One of the reasons for leaving mentioned was the cumbersome licensing requirement of Vermont. Efforts are being made to assist those needing provincial licenses.
Michael also mentioned that the EEL5 report provides demographic insights and that they are currently working on resolving data issues for more accurate reporting to the federal authorities next year. Both Tim and Deborah expressed their gratitude to Michael for the update.
We will be meeting on August 1st and will set goals for the new year and pick our top four things to work on.
