The Normandy Schools Collaborative has hired Diana Bourisaw, former superintendent for the St. Louis Public Schools and the Fox School district, for a six-month consulting contract to help improve the district’s lagging academic performance.
After the district’s appointed school board approved the $4,715-a-month contract at a special meeting on Thursday, Superintendent Ty McNichols explained that Bourisaw will be performing work formerly done by assistant Superintendent Carrie Launius, who resigned in October. He said Bourisaw's earnings would be less than the departed assistant superintendent would have been making from January through June, the term of the agreement with Bourisaw.
“We need the support,” McNichols said. “She’s filling that void right now. So it’s not that we’re bringing in a consultant on top of what we have. In lieu of not having an assistant superintendent, she’s filling that void with her technical expertise.”
Thursday’s meeting included just one member of the Normandy Joint Executive Governing Board, President Charles Pearson, appearing in person. Two other members, Richard Ryffel and Andrea Terhune, joined via computer, providing a quorum; members Reginald Dickson and Sheila Williams were absent.
Bourisaw’s contract was approved with minimal discussion. McNichols explained to board members that Normandy had gotten some help from another educator for a month or two, but she could no longer help the district. Efforts to find others had little success, he said.
“The state sent us a number of names of retired people who might be interested,” he told the board. “Nobody wanted to come out of retirement.”
When they looked around some more, McNichols said after the meeting, they came to an agreement with Bourisaw, who now operates a consulting business, Learning Curve Advisors.
“We sought people that we thought would be interested in helping us temporarily,” he said. “And we didn’t get a lot of bite on it, so we reached out to her, and she said she would be interested in supporting Normandy.”
Normandy plans to seek a permanent person for the job starting in the spring, he said, but no one suitable is available at this point. “There would be a number of people who would be interested in this,” he said. “But they’re locked into contracts now.”
Bourisaw was not present at the board meeting. Reached by phone before the board met, she said she would rather officials in Normandy discuss the consulting arrangement. Her hiring was done under new authority over personnel granted by the state board of education earlier this month.
According to the proposal approved by the Normandy board, Bourisaw will work with faculty and students in the district to achieve a number of goals, including building leadership, establishing high standards and goals for students and teachers, develop curriculum aligned with state standards and strengthening support for work by her department.
The contract can be canceled by either Normandy or Bourisaw, with 30 days’ notice.
“I am grateful for the opportunity to support the mission of Normandy Schools Collaborative,” Bourisaw said in her proposal. “Together we will produce results that will positively impact the lives of those you serve.”
Bourisaw’s tenure in St. Louis and Fox both ended on a rocky note.
A graduate of McCluer North High School, she was hired in 1996 as superintendent of the Fox district in Jefferson County. But four years later, she was fired in a public dispute with the district’s board. In 2008, after serving first as interim superintendent, then full-time superintendent for the St. Louis Public Schools, she once again found herself out of a job after being ousted by that district’s appointed board.
In addition to her service in those districts, Bourisaw has filled many other roles in education, including chief academic officer for Pearson, a nationwide school publishing and assessment company; deputy chancellor of schools for the state of Florida; founder of a charter school consulting company in St. Louis; and vice chair of the Missouri Coordinating Board for Higher Education.
Her hiring as a consultant follows Normandy’s entering into a contract with a division of Kelly Services to provide substitute teachers for the district and a contract with the national Parents as Teachers center to bolster its program of home visits for families with pre-school children.
At Thursday’s special meeting, the Normandy board also accepted a draft version of the district audit by the firm Kerber, Eck and Braeckel.
The firm echoed the finding by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education that Normandy faces financial jeopardy because of the continuing costs for tuition and transportation for students who choose to transfer to nearby accredited school districts. The audit noted that Normandy finished the last school year with a fund balance of just 1.5 percent, far below the level recommended by the state.
It recounted steps taken by Normandy to improve its financial footing, including layoffs of personnel and the closing of an elementary school midway through the last school year. Still, it noted the negative effect of the ruling by the Missouri Supreme Court in June 2013 that sparked the transfer of about 1,000 Normandy students to other districts.
“The financial impact of the Missouri Supreme Court ruling will continue to challenge the district as a going concern,” the audit said.
The audit also found that Normandy needs to keep better records of the students who transfer and their transportation.
The board adopted the draft audit with minimal questioning.
