Sean C. Morgan
Mike Reynolds returns to the District 55 School Board chairman’s seat this school year.
Reynolds, in his 12th year on the board, served as chairman for four years prior to Jason Redick, who stepped down from the position after four years on July 14. When Reynolds joined the board, now-retired Supt. Larry Horton was new to the district.
He didn’t run for the board with any plans to fix any particular problems in the district, he said. He was serving on the bond oversight committee for the bond measure that rebuilt the majority of the high school.
“My goal was pretty simple,” he said. “It was just to give back.”
Reynolds, 55, and his wife Paula have had two daughters go through Sweet Home schools, Pam and Melissa. He was able to award a high school diploma to Melissa after joining the board.
He is a 1977 graduate of Sweet Home High School after moving here from Eugene.
Reynolds is the information technology manager at Cascade Timber Consulting, which manages timber land owned by the Hill family. He has been with CTC for 34 years.
He said he plans to run for the School Board again in the spring unless something changes between now and then.
“I think it’s going pretty good,” Reynolds said of the district. Contract negotiations have gone well recently, and the district has adapted to a four-day school week after switching to that schedule for budgetary reasons.
Next year, the board will take a good, hard look at academic data and seek input from parents, the community and staff members about the length of the school week, Reynolds said. “I’m hopeful that it will remain positive. Because of the four-day week, we’re doing a lot with professional development, with professional learning communities time.”
The thing he likes about the four-day week is the professional development opportunities, he said, and it doesn’t appear detrimental to academic performance.
“I am for the four-day week,” Reynolds said, not so much for the savings but rather for the professional development. It provides time for teacher collaboration and training for the many changes occurring right now in education.
That said, “I’m not opposed to going back to a five-day week,” Reynolds said, and he is “absolutely open” to the idea.
Alluding to the recent superintendent evaluation, Reynolds agrees that the board needs to take another look at the form.
The board adjusted and streamlined the form while Horton was superintendent, Reynolds said. It was longer and “horrible” then, and it may need further adjustments.
Supt. Don Schrader has stressed technological advancement over the past three years, something Reynolds said he supports.
“I’m all for it,” he said. The district needs to take technology as far as it can. “Kids are going to embrace the technology.”
The question is whether the district can get tablets into all students’ hands, he said. He supports it if the district can find a way to make it work.
That creates interesting opportunities, such as all textbooks in one place for students, he said.
All-day kindergarten also is on the horizon, with funding available statewide in the 2015-16 school year.
While districts may not be required to offer it, he said, based on financial data, it may be financially irresponsible not to offer it.
It will pay for itself and then some, Reynolds said. The downside is the impact it may have on programs like Little Promises, which operates at the old Pleasant Valley building.
The concept was controversial at the board level this year when district staff proposed beginning it in 2014-15 in the proposed budget, but Reynolds said he has no problem with the idea.
“I did it when I was little.”
The board has approved an “expanded kindergarten” program, which will give all kindergarten students the opportunity to go all day twice a week.