A March email sent by Conway School District Superintendent Jeff Collum caused so much confusion that Education Secretary Jacob Oliva later emailed superintendents statewide to clarify matters and to distance the state from Collum’s plan to make cuts in a job-training program.
The confusion began after Collum emailed superintendents in the nearby Quitman and Vilonia school districts on March 14 to say the Conway district would end its partnership with them on certain Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs as of June 30.
“This letter is to notify you that Conway Public School District has received notification from the Office of Skills Development that it can no longer provide area services or serve as a pass-through for funding for career and technical programs in which a Conway Public School District student is not enrolled,” Collum told Quitman Superintendent Dennis Truxler.
As a result, Collum said Conway was discontinuing the medical professions and construction programs taking place in Quitman, effective June 30. In a similar email to Vilonia Superintendent Doug Adams, Collum said Conway would also discontinue the medical professions training program in Vilonia June 30.
In a March 15 email to Conway School Board members, Collum said both programs would still be offered at Conway High School. Less than a week after Collum contacted Vilonia and Quitman, word of the cuts was out.
As a result, Oliva sent the statewide email advising that neither the state Education Department nor the Commerce Department had cut Career and Technical Education funding and had no plans to do so.
“In fact, quite the opposite is true,” Oliva wrote.
Oliva also included a statement from the Commerce Department’s Office of Skills Development which stressed that the state had no input on Conway’s decision and that the governor’s fiscal 2025 budget proposal would increase career-center funding by $4 million.
“Conway School District’s decision to suspend the Conway Area Career Center satellite programs on the Quitman and Vilonia campuses was made on a local level by the district,” the statement said. It added: “Neither the Department of Education nor the Department of Commerce (Office of Skills Development) were aware of Conway School District’s letter and notification provided to the Quitman and Vilonia School Districts. Both ADE and OSD have been in contact with both districts to discuss opportunities for their students enrolled in these pathways for next school year.”
You can read Oliva’s full email here.
Collum’s explanation for the cuts seems to conflict with Oliva’s email, at least based on a simple reading of a March 15 email Collum sent to school board members.
In that email obtained by the Arkansas Times under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act, Collum blamed the situation on “funding cuts” and the rising costs of “materials, equipment, and salaries.”
“There have been a lot of changes and ‘moving parts’ within the last several months that had to be addressed,” he wrote. “These moves had to be made in order to help us be in compliance and responsive to funding cuts in these areas.” He also said the school district had been notified by the Arkansas education department’s career training division earlier in March “that no projected additional funds for Vocational Center Aid will be forthcoming from the legislature for this next fiscal year.”
Collum said the district also could not sustain current expenditures “into the future to continue programming at the current level.” Collum specifically mentioned in his communication with school board members that no full-time paraprofessionals would be employed in the future in the district’s Career and Technical Education program.
People currently in these positions were notified on March 13 of the decision so they would have ample time to prepare before June 30. They also were encouraged to apply for other jobs in the district, he said. It’s unclear how many employees’s jobs were affected or eliminated, but it’s clear that the cuts went beyond paraprofessionals.
In response to my request for a number of people whose jobs were affected, Conway school attorney Shastady Wagner sent a list of 24 names and their positions. Among them was the Conway CTE director Sheryl Turner along with a bookkeeper, and Conway Area Career Center supervisor Karey Smith.
Wagner’s response did not overtly state these were the employees affected, but such appeared to be the case, and I’ve I’ve talked on background with at least one of them who was affected. So, was Oliva or Collum being less forthright? Or is there more to the story? In yet another email, an Oliva subordinate seems to support Collum’s version of the financial issues, though his email was written considerably earlier than Oliva’s.
On or about March 1, Ross White, director of the Arkansas Department of Education’s Career and Technical Education division, emailed Conway Area Career Center supervisor Smith to say, “At this time, we do not anticipate any increases in the Vocational Center Aid payment that is directed to our secondary career centers. Meaning that the current funding stream we plan to level fund as it was in the FY24 budget. Meaning no increases in funding. The only increases you would see would be a direct impact of increased student enrollment. We know that [costs] continue to rise for your programs–forcing you all to make decisions about programming.”