News Photo by Reagan Voetberg People converse at the Alpena Public Schools Board of Education meeting on Monday. The board discussed policy changes that sparked debate between several board members and staff.

ALPENA — At the Alpena Public Schools board workshop meeting Monday night, board member Eric Lawson suggested a change in board policy that sparked controversy with some of his colleagues.

The policies that Lawson discussed amending were Policy 2521 and Policy 9130.

Policy 2521 dictates the selection of instructional materials, equipment, and media.

“The Superintendent shall develop administrative guidelines for the selection and maintenance of all educational and instructional materials, equipment, and media,” the policy reads. “In addition s/he shall periodically, provide for a systematic review, by the Board, of the District’s educational resources in order to ensure that they are appropriate for the current educational program. Any revisions that occur should be a result of the school-improvement process.”

Policy 9130 deals with public complaints and grievances.

The policy walks through the process of how parents, guardians, or community members can approach the district with complaints. Lawson was specifically concerned about the process in place for matters regarding instructional materials.

For any complaint, the district first asks for complainants to resolve the situation informally. At the meeting, Superintendent Dave Rabbideau gave an example where a concerned community member approached him about a book in the junior high library. They had a conversation about the book and Rabbideau pulled the book from the shelf.

In situations where a complaint is not resolved informally, the complainant can move to the formal process. For educational materials, that includes first addressing the principal in writing detailing the issue. The principal can then appoint a review committee, which the complainant will be a part of.

If the complainant disagrees with the committee’s decision, they can appeal the decision through a written request to the superintendent. The superintendent will then give all the information related to the case to the board, who will come to a final decision about the matter.

“No challenged material may be removed from the curriculum or from a collection of resource materials except by action of the Board, and no challenged material may be removed solely because it presents ideas that may be unpopular or offensive to some,” The last paragraph of the policy reads. “Any Board action to remove material will be accompanied by the Board’s statement of its reasons for the removal.”

“The board, they make the final decision about any material, as far as removing it,” Lawson said. “If that is the case, I think it might be helpful to streamline this. Maybe put a sentence in both of these policies basically stating that the board can remove a material by a majority vote of the board because that’s really what it comes down to at the end of 9130.”

Board President Anna Meinhardt questioned Lawson on why a person could not just go through the formal process that is already in place.

“It’s a very long process,” he said in response.

Meinhardt said that no one has ever brought forth any material.

“It’s just strange, unless there’s an ulterior motive about why we’re doing this,” she said. “Like, if people are having problems, they’re not bringing us materials saying they have concerns.”

Lawson explained his point further.

“I could imagine a world in which someone would look at the process and say there’s no way I’m gonna get anything done that way,” Lawson said. “They might bring things to the board directly. The board looks at the material in question and decides, yes this should be removed, then the board should be able to vote to do so.

“Again, it’s not really changing anything, except that the board can do this when it sees fit as opposed to having to wait for this other process to take place.”

Rabbideau also expressed his concerns with Lawson’s proposal.

“I’m very concerned if at public comment, or, you know, on the streets, or through an email, someone can say, ‘I would like this removed,’ and all it takes is a majority vote of the board with no process defined to go through and do that,” he said.

Rabbideau said that most people that have had a problem with material in the curriculum have chosen to opt-out and solve the issue informally.

Meinhardt added that her kid was assigned to read “The Kite Runner” this year. She said that a note came home asking whether Meinhardt approved of the choice, otherwise, the teacher would find a different book.

“Taking staff out of the equation is crazy to me,” she said, referring to the part of the process where a committee chosen by the principal would review the material.

“All of the sudden, I feel like we’re not letting our teachers have a say or tell us why they’re using a book or why they have it in their classroom,” Meinhardt said. “I don’t know, I mean that’s crazy to me that we would take our educators out of the picture.”

“My recommendation is no,” Rabbideau said. “This opens the door to anyone that can make a compelling argument to five or four people on this board to remove something, that’s really dangerous.”

Lawson clarified that there could still be some sort of process for people approaching the board with a complaint, but just not as involved as the one currently in place.

“Let’s say the board becomes aware of something and the person is not willing, for whatever reason, to involve themselves in that process,” he said. “Why shouldn’t the board be able to take that up? If you want a process, then maybe we need to work on what that process might look like for the board to basically do this.

“I think that to basically say that the board’s hands are tied and if somebody were to come before the board, you can’t do anything about it, again, that does (impress) me as being in conflict with what statute actually says about board policy.

“I don’t see what’s so damaging about allowing the board to initiate this process,” he concluded.

Board member Monica Dziesinski supported Lawson’s idea, saying that teachers could still be involved in the process through public comment at board meetings.

“I mean, we want public comment, we want voices,” she said.

Board member Sarah Fritz took issue with Lawson’s proposed changes, reiterating the point that nobody has ever used the process, and that Lawson was wasting time by bringing it up.

Lawson said that people have approached him with issues and Fritz asked why he hasn’t asked them to fill out the form for formal complaints.

“I think there’s just not a lot of faith, necessarily, that this will produce any action,” he said.

“How do you know it’s not going to produce any action if we don’t try it?” Fritz responded.

Lawson again stated his main point in response to Fritz’s objections.

“The board, given that it’s the final arbiter, I don’t believe it’s strange for the board to have some mechanism to do this itself, but you know, I’m just one guy,” he said.

In a phone interview, Lawson stated that a board member during the meeting made it sound like he was trying to eliminate the formal process for complaints about materials completely, but that is untrue. He said that complainants can still go through that process if they wish, but wants to offer the option of skipping a very long process if they choose to come directly to the board.

He also clarified that he has no problem with teacher input and that board members can absolutely seek staff input before voting on issues like removing material from the curriculum.

The board did not say if or when the discussion would be revisited.

Reagan Voetberg can be reached at 989-358-5683 or rvoetberg@TheAlpenaNews.com.