After a controversial year Park County School District #6 has four new trustees on its seven-member school board.
The district, which includes Cody, debated and eventually passed the CKA policy, which allows certain teachers and staff to conceal carry, and dealt with the logistics behind removing a book from the school system.
Now the newly elected trustees want to move on to other issues. John McCue is a Cody native and a new trustee. He said he was motivated to run to ensure these policies would not remain the focal point and concentrate on things like teacher morale.
"I think the part of the problem is that the district thinks our kids are the product of the school and that anybody can do a teacher's job," said McCue. "A big product of our schools is good teachers, and as a byproduct, they produce good students."
Cathy Roes, another new trustee, agrees with McCue that teacher morale is important, but as an individual with a business background, she said she would like to work on making the budget more transparent.
"There were some items on there that lacked an explanation, and as I met with other board members it took a considerable amount of time to figure out what some of those things are. And that is somewhat disconcerting to me," said Roes.
Brandi Nelson and Karen Schipfmann-Nielson, the two other new trustees, agree that the school board has done a good job fine-tuning controversial policies including curriculum review, and are hoping to move on with other issues.
