Dr. Robert McDowell’s last school board meeting as superintendent of the Hastings School District was Wednesday night.
He resigned in the spring at the close of the school year after three …
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Dr. Robert McDowell’s last school board meeting as superintendent of the Hastings
School District was Wednesday night.
He resigned in the spring at the close of the school year after three years in the district’s top job. Incoming Superintendent Dr. Tamara “Tammy” Champa took over duties July 1.
McDowell oversaw the district during the COVID pandemic and a fractured school board that came out of its wake. He took over the position at the start of the 2020-21 school year and told the school board he is leaving to pursue other opportunities. He also has been an educational consultant and worked with universities.
Board Chair Lisa Hedin presented McDowell with a Hastings Raider logo blanket to remember his time in the district.
“I just want to take a minute out of the board meeting and thank you,” said Hedin. “I really, really thank you for the three years of service you’ve given the Hastings School District. You came in during an extremely tumultuous time period, three years ago today, and you led us in such a professional way.
“You advanced the discipline of our district. You advanced our commitment, and you’ve served the students and the staff very, very well. I just want to thank you for that.”
Champa was superintendent in the Pine Island School District for 12 years. During that time, the district enrollment grew 25 percent, while Hastings enrollment counts decrease annually, leading to budgetary challenges. Her first major project at Hastings will be guiding the district through a likely referendum in November for technology and curriculum dollars.
The district had intended to have a referendum question on the November ballot for renewal of an operating levy that expires after the 2023-24 school year. However, the Minnesota State Legislature at its session this year gave school board’s authority to extend the 10-year operating levies one times, and the Hastings School Board unanimously did that.
Buoyed by a spring survey of district residents that showed support for additional technology and curriculum dollars, the board had already been considering asking voters for support in a fall referendum.
The board will discuss that new possible referendum question at its July 12 work session. If it intends to have a referendum on the November ballot, board approval needs to happen at the July 27 regular board meeting.
McDowell told the board that while the state legislature did give schools additional per pupil aid in its session this year, they also saddled districts with additional mandates.
“We’re going to keep the focus on our referendum conversation,” he said. “The board has been pretty overt about having discussions about what in addition to that (operating levy) renewal needs to happen in order for us to sustain the work that not only our teachers and students are working on, but the district as a whole needs to have in place.”
Being able to levy separately for things like technology and curriculum will allow the district to take those things out of its general fund expenditures.
“Now discussion around the technology levy, the curriculum levy are in place, that’s what the work of the board will be this summer, to figure out what does that look like, because those dollars would provide an opportunity to free up some general fund expenditures that we currently are not made whole on, even with the amount of money that’s coming in from the state this year. There are also mandates that have happened. There’s going to be lots of things that are going to take personnel to pull off in the next 18 months with all school district, not just Hastings, because of the legislative work that was done,” said McDowell. “I’m very confident with Dr. Champa coming in. We’ve been having conversations about what does this look like? What do we need to do? What’s been happening? I feel like it’s going to be a pretty seamless process with how we move forward with you as a board and with the community.”
