School Board members wrangle over little known position

A school job that many people probably never heard of snared the St. Landry Parish School Board in nearly an hour long discussion.
The assistive technology job involves helping special needs students with devices that enable them to learn.
The job is open after it was filled for up to 25 years by the same person.
Board members Mary Ellen Donatto, of Eunice, and Hazel Sias, of Opelousas, found the job description handed to the Board by the administration lacking at Thursday’s meeting.
Sias said the person should be given other duties such as assisting with technology for special education in general and specifically making sure software is licensed and available to special education students.
The administration’s job description reduced the position from 12 to 10 months and included qualifications that would have allowed hiring someone without experience in special education.
Mary Doucet, special education administrator, said the person would not have time to do other duties. The position, besides fitting students with gear, includes diagnostic responsibilities and helping with areas such as occupational and physical therapies, she said.
The assistive technologist serves 90-plus students, she said.
Sias seized on the number of students and said the previous assistive technologist worked with 16 students in 2016-17 and 11 students since May.
Doucet said she is not creating a job, just asking for a position to be reopened in questioning why the job was contested.
That opened up a can of worms for Donatto, who noted the Board has nothing to do with hiring.
“But the Board has everything to do with jobs being in effect and job descriptions. For the clarity of those in the audience and maybe to remind Board members, we are policy makers and, yes, we have much to do with job descriptions,” Donatto said.
Donatto added that some people believe Act 1, which handed hiring and firing powers over to school superintendents, stripped the School Board of any oversight over jobs. The oversight remains though with the Board’s authority over job creation and discriptions.
Randy Wagley, an Opelousas Board member, questioned the timing of the job description’s arrival for Board review and approval.
Filling the job was presented as an emergency, but it was known the person was going to retire for months, he said.
“That happens a lot. That’s my problem,” Wagley said.
Donnie Perron, a Port Barre Board member, said the Board is saving money with the change from a 12-month to 10-month job and members should have confidence in the administration.
Sias questioned why the previous jobholder had a degree in speech pathology and the new job description lowered the qualifications.
Donatto said a neighboring school district with 31,000 students has one assistive technologist and is a high-performing district.
“We don’t have 13,000 children and were allowing someone to do just this?’ she asked.
Donatto, citing “reliable sources,” said the parish schools are late in getting software licensed for special education children.
Donatto eventually won the backing of the Board to require the job be filled by someone with at least five years of successful teaching in special education.
Board legal counsel Courtney Joiner said the Board could reopen the job description to include other duties at a later time.