HANCOCK — After three trustee resignations and three replacement appointments since July, and the resignation of the Hancock Public Schools superintendent, the new Board of Education trustees and officers have begun settling into their new positions.

One of their first priorities is assessing the best manner of conducting business.

Among those changes are regular work sessions, the second of which was held Wednesday evening and was open to the public.

President Catherine Jordan opened the meeting saying there is a long list of agenda items, some of which she wanted to make comments on to provide Board members the opportunity to weigh in, making sure, she said, to address them publicly to avoid any possible violations of law.

“If we were to so some of this through email, it could potentially be a violation of the Open Meetings Act,” she explained, “so we want to just make sure that we can be at the Board table together and talk about some of these things.”

Included on the list was the topic of a Committee of the Whole, versus member-assignment committees, along with a discussion on including as many faculty and staff members as possible to increase communication with all involved and assist the Board in implementing policy changes as well as new ones.

“What I’d like to do,” said Jordan, “is to get some feedback from you, as to moving forward, some pros and cons on signing up for committees and attending committee meetings, or doing what we’ve done in the past couple years where we treat every committee meeting as almost like a Board meeting.”

One drawback, she said, is that all Board members must be present. Trustee Wendy Chynoweth asked if the committees are open only to Board members or faculty and staff, adding that she would like to have as many faculty and staff members as possible involved in order for the Board to get their feedback, thoughts and opinions on issues. Jordan agreed.

“They’re the ones with the curriculum,” she said. “They’re the ones who are going to be implement it, they have the professional background, expertise.”

Vice President Michael Lancour said the main advantage of a committee of the whole is that every board member is aware of all areas, whereas with individual committees, members are only thoroughly knowledgeable on those committees they sit on. Jordan commented that with a committee of the whole, focused discussions tended to fall by the wayside. She said she could not recall the last time there was a committee of the whole meeting on curriculum.

She listed a number of past committees, including:

• Building and Site

•Crisis

•Curriculum

• Finance

• District/School Improvement

• Policy

• Public Relations

• Negotiations

On some business, Lancour pointed out, a committee of the whole would not work for negotiations, because a Negotiations Committee consists of three members. Interim Superintendent Chris Salani commented that based on observation and as an indirect participant, his experience has been that the Board was less structured in identifying specific work loads that was previous done by committees. In regards to annual reviews of curriculum, he cited as an example, a committee of the whole was less effective and had less impact. With a strong structural element, he added, better preparations could be made based on more available information to to work with, and also schedule the review effectively and appropriately.

While the Board did not make a decision on committees or a committee of the whole, Jordan said she was happy with the discussion, as trustees and faculty provided good input to the discussion which would help the board make a more informed decision on whether to work to improve a committee of the whole or form individual committees.