Wright City schools confront 21% staff turnover

John Rohlf, Staff Writer
Posted 8/12/22

The Wright City R-II School Board is discussing how to analyze recent staff turnover data and how to move forward as a district.

Wright City R-II Assistant Superintendent Jeremy Way presented the …

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Wright City schools confront 21% staff turnover

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The Wright City R-II School Board is discussing how to analyze recent staff turnover data and how to move forward as a district.

Wright City R-II Assistant Superintendent Jeremy Way presented the district’s turnover data from last school year to the present during the school board’s July meeting. The district’s turnover rate from last school year to this school year was 21 percent, Way said. This is the highest turnover rate the district had over the past seven years. The district had three other years with under 10 percent in turnover and three years of turnover between 13 percent to 17 percent.

There are 33 staff members who will not return to the district for the upcoming school year. Of the 33 not returning to the district, 22 former staff members were offered a contract but resigned from their position. Three staff members retired. The remaining eight staff members last school year were not renewed for the upcoming school year.

School board President Austin Jones supported the district publishing detailed turnover rate numbers. While the 21 percent number is accurate for how many employees did not return to the district, only eight of the 33 staff leaving are staff the district did not want to return.

Jones conceded the district needs to look at how to adjust its hiring process to avoid a situation where the district does not want eight employees to return to the district.

“Twenty-one percent is a bad number,” Jones said. “We did something wrong on the hiring process on those eight. So we own that. The fact of the matter is we hired those eight individuals and we non-renew them or they resigned because they were getting non-renewed, that’s on our hiring process. So that’s what we need to fix.”

Board member Michael Bates supported the district focusing on the 22 employees who resigned from their position despite the district wanting the employees to return. He believes the district should look at the circumstances of the resignations and how long the employees have worked for the district.

“Are these one-year hires, two-year hires, three-year hires?” Bates asked. “Because I think that tells a different question. If these are all one-year hires, then I think that does identify maybe an opportunity in our hiring process. Maybe we need to reevaluate that. If these are five-year people that are leaving, then I think that begs a different question.”

The district also had significant internal movement going into next school year, compared to the past few years. Way believes this is in part due to the district’s Aspiring Administrator team that was started three years ago by Way and Assistant Superintendent Doug Smith.

“That’s been really good to help us identify future leaders,” Way said. “And this past year, eight out of the nine of them had moved up to some sort of administrative or higher level position in our organization. So we’re excited about that. That’s a plus. … We’ll see what that means going forward.”

Wright City School District, Turnover, Retention

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