New Clarksdale Munici-pal School District Dr. Earl Joe Nelson had his first chance to meet the community at one location and attend his first board meeting.
A meet and greet took place Sunday afternoon at Clarksdale High School, while the board met on Tuesday, July 30.
During Nelson’s remarks at the meet and greet, he said he made his decision to come to Clarksdale because of the school board. He introduced his wife, Dr. Melanie Nelson, and two of his children, Aaron and Skye, who were both president.
Nelson’s father, Earl Joe Nelson Sr., is a Cleveland East Side High School graduate.
“I was born in Bolivar County Hospital,” Nelson said. “Didn’t get an opportunity to live in the Delta, but I got a chance to experience the Delta in the summer. My father sent me back one summer to visit with my aunt and my cousins to get a taste of the cotton field is what he called it.”
Nelson said three things he wanted to do as superintendent were bring a community culture of success, be results-driven to improve the districts accountability grade with the Mississippi Department of Education and build on the innovation.
The MDE accountability grade is currently an F.
The audience had an opportunity to ask Nelson questions about his vision.
Nelson talked about looking from within the district to promote employees. He noted a certification program pays for teacher assistants to go to college and become certified instructors.
“We here in Clarksdale have a career and technical center,” Nelson said. “We have a teacher ed program in that center.”
Nelson said the MDE offers certification options he is looking at for the CMSD.
“The teacher shortage is a national problem,” Nelson said. “It’s not just Mississippi. We’re going to look within, but then we’re going to attract people to Clarksdale. I want people coming to Clarksdale buying houses and raising family here. Downtown is awesome. I’ve been telling people you can get blues 24 hours, seven days a week in downtown Clarksdale. You have something to offer. There’s a church on every corner. You have some things to offer to move and raise a family.”
Nelson said he wants people to buy homes and invest in the community.
Clarksdale resident Cedell Brownlee brought up the same issue at the school board meeting July 30.
“I think you ought to search within the people already here,” Brownlee said. “Every time something comes up, people want to bring somebody in.”
Brownlee said, if he was an employee, and the district was looking outside instead of internally to promote employees, he would probably leave.
“He is held accountable for the performance of this district and if there is somebody better to come in for a particular position from Jackson, Gulfport, Stark-ville, Oxford, Cleveland or wherever, does anybody really want to promote somebody from within the system if there’s somebody better qualified from outside the system that wants to come in?” replied board president H. Clay Stillions. “That’s what we have to look at. We’re not looking at giving jobs to local people. We have a lot of local people working here. We’re looking at raising the standard of our education so that our schools are not a failing district anymore. We need to perform, not give jobs to local people. That’s our mission is education our student, not employment. That’s our answer.”
At the meet and greet, board vice president Delores S. Harris said the search for a new leader was in conjunction with the Mississippi School Board Association.
Harris described Nelson as an “exceptional leader that possesses strong communication, good listening skills, passion and commitment, positivity, innovation, collaboration, honesty, diplomacy, empathy, humility and we really, really believe we found him.”
Harris said Nelson, who was a principal in the Pass Christian School District, will have to make changes.
“The greatest challenge in new leadership is changing the culture and existing frameworks,” Harris said. “The goal is to get things done efficiently and effectively. Everyone has to understand that with every new leader comes changing from before or previous leaders, yet the ultimate goal of the team is success.”
Clarksdale mayor Chuck Espy spoke and talked about how he already knew Nelson from his time as a state representative. He also had friendships with some of Nelson’s family member and friends.
Espy also spoke about change.
“Change is difficult,” he said. “In the Mississippi Delta, you can have a lot of things that happen, but guess what? We have some challenges before us. Sometimes in this community and I just want to tell you the truth because I want to say it truthfully to the people in the audience and everyone that will work with you. Sometimes we get set in our ways.
“As the mayor of the city, when I came in, I made some pretty bold promises and it made a lot of people feel uncomfortable, but sometimes we have to do the uncomfortable things to bring our city to the next level. As much as I want to tell you that everyone’s going to greet you with roses, when we start talking about change and stepping on folks toes, you’re going to get some resistance.”
Board member Joan Morris concurred with the sentiment of change.
“We will see changes,” she said. “Sometimes we resist these changes, but new ideas, new procedures will bring us a new result. We, as a board, can assure you as parents, whatever your role is in this community, we want different results.
“I hope as we embark together on this school year that we will come together as a new family working to educate our children to become good, successful, caring citizens.”
Stillions said Pass Christian was a blue ribbon school district and ranked in the top 250 of the United States. He said six of the 20 candidates went through the interview process.
“As much as I liked them all, Dr. Nelson stood out,” Stillions said. “He was the unanimous choice of this board to lead the district. We have complete confidence that he will lead this district forward and we will achieve the goals that we set for ourselves and our children.”
In other business
• The district passed the 2019-20 budget with $25,332,281.55 in revenues and $33,470,020.29 in expenditures for a deficit of $8,137,738.64.
Business manager Kamilah Woods explained money from the $8.5 million bond passed in 2017 was used to pay for things such as the new football field being constructed at the high school.
“Capital projects, you won’t see any revenue,” Woods said. “You’ll see the expenditures are so high because all of the money was received in the bond issue in the previous year.”
• The board also approved paying Funchess and Beane Consulting Services $10,800 for nine days of services for English Language Acquisi-tion, $28,800 for curriculum alignment for ELA and math for 24 days and $24,000 for 20 days of data coaching. The money will come from Title I funding.
“Do we have any proof that they are effective in our district or have been effective?” said Harris before the expenditures were approv-ed.
Federal projects director Dr. Manika Kemp said there have been evaluations.
“From the information that we received, not only did we get excellent grades from the staff, we also have the principals,” Kemp said. “If you care to talk to any of the principals here, they can tell you about the performance in their building.”
Stillions said performance in math and ELA have been concerns.
“Maybe we just need to do a better job of enforcing the implementation or hold those teachers that don’t use it accountable,” he said. “Because they’re not using it and not meeting standards.”
Nelson said he would vet ELA and mathematics during the first 90 days of the school year, which begins Monday, Aug. 12.
