Nevada Ed-Watch 12/15/20

The Ed-Watch series is designed to increase access to information on what decisions are being made regarding public education in Clark County and Nevada.


Clark County School District Board of Trustees 

What is the Board of Trustees & what are they responsible for? The CCSD Trustees are publicly elected decision-makers for the school district. They are responsible for providing oversight to the Superintendent and establishing District-wide policy. Trustees are accountable to work with their communities to improve student achievement.

Click here to learn more and see a list of current Trustees

Click here to find your Trustee District

How often does the Board of Trustees meet? Trustees meet twice per month (second and fourth Thursdays) at 5 pm. While all meetings are typically held at the Edward A. Greer Education Center (Board Room): 2832 E. Flamingo Road, Las Vegas, NV 89121, all meetings are now held virtually due to the COVID-19 crisis. 

Click here for a full list of Trustees meetings and agendas

Click here to visit Hope For Nevada’s #NVEd Calendar

Can community members engage at Trustee Meetings? Decision-making bodies benefit greatly from hearing public input and multiple perspectives. Community members can sign up to speak after the agenda has been posted– by calling the Board Office at (702) 799-1072 at least 3 hours before the scheduled meeting, or signing up in-person at the beginning of the meeting. Prior to each agenda item being voted on, speakers can share their perspective after the Board’s discussion and prior to the vote.


Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Clark County School District Board of Trustees Meeting

Click here to see the meeting agenda

What happened at this meeting?

Public Comment

Members of the public submitted comments online. Public comment was not read directly into the record, rather an oral summary of each comment was provided to Trustees.

  • Click here & here to view public comment on agenda and non-agenda items.

Board Approved Summative Evaluation of the Superintendent of Schools

The purpose of the Summative Evaluation process is to develop a single Superintendent Evaluation that combines and synthesizes the individual evaluations each Trustee conducted for the Superintendent. The evaluation process was facilitated by Dr. Thomas Alsbury, founder and president of Balanced Governance Solutions.

Prior to the summative evaluation, the Board’s seven Trustees completed individual evaluations of Superintendent Jara for 2020. This is the Superintendent’s second evaluation following the first evaluation in December 2019. 

Growth Suggestions provided in the Trustees’ evaluations of the Superintendent were compiled and anonymously recorded in a rating sheet. Trustees rated each Growth Suggestion and returned the document to Dr. Alsbury on December 14. All Growth Suggestions scoring an average rating of 3 (Agree) or 4 (Strongly Agree) were compiled into a summative evaluation draft by Dr. Alsbury who also combined identical or similar suggestions, when possible, to avoid repetition. The draft was sent back to Trustees on December 14. At the December 15 meeting, Trustees discussed the summative evaluation draft to determine which Growth Suggestions to include in the final Superintendent Evaluation document.  

Click here to view the summative evaluation process.

Trustees also discussed the ratings from the Superintendent’s evaluation. Trustees used an evaluation tool that included nine indicators under four areas of focus, rating the Superintendent in each indicator on a scale of 1 to 4. The categories represent the focus areas agreed upon by the Board of Trustees and the Superintendent for the 2020 evaluation year.

Rating scale: 

1 = Did not meet the standard.
2 = Inconsistently met the standard or the standard was met with frequent and avoidable errors.
3 = Consistently met the standard with minimal errors.
4 = Consistently met the standard.

Superintendent Average Performance Ratings by Indicator: 

  1. Effective Operational Oversight 
    • 1A: Major changes to Organizational Structure – Total Average rating: 2.2
    • 1B: Focus on Student Success & Equity – Total Average rating: 2.1
    • 1C: Major Financial Issues – Total Average Rating = 3.2
  2. Effective Progress Monitoring & Reporting
    • 2A: Report Progress to Trustees – Total Average Rating = 2.9  
  3. Effective Communication
    • 3A: Communicates Effectively with Trustees – Total Average Rating = 2.4
    • 3B: Communicates Effectively with Broader Community – Total Average Rating = 2.3
    • 3C: Communicates Effectively with Internal staff – Total Average Rating = 2.0
  4. Effective Collaborative Leadership
    • 4A: Models Community Inclusion – Total Average Rating = 2.6
    • 4B: Promote a Collaborative Culture – Total Average Rating = 2.1

Trustees unanimously approved a motion for Dr. Alsbury to merge Growth Suggestions using feedback from Trustees to complete and finalize the Superintendent’s evaluation. The final Superintendent Evaluation, to include the merged Growth Suggestions along with ratings, is anticipated to be completed this week.

Click here to see Superintendent Jara’s self-evaluation.
Click here to see the summary rating scores from Trustee evaluations.
Click here to see submitted evidence for each focus area.
Click here to read more about this in The Nevada Independent.


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