H. B. 4652
(By Delegate M. Poling)
[Introduced
February 22, 2010
; referred to the
Committee on Education.]
A BILL to amend the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, by
adding thereto a new section, designated §18-5-45a, relating
to establishing a school calendar committee for each county;
specifying membership and method of selecting members; minimum
meetings; proposals of school calendar options for vote of
employees; requirements of proposals; preparation and
distribution of ballots and tabulation of results; process for
new options if school calendar voted by employees is rejected
by county or state board; waivers and modifications.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That the Code of West Virginia, 1931, as amended, be amended
by adding thereto a new section, designated §18-5-45a, to read as
follows:
ARTICLE 5. COUNTY BOARD OF EDUCATION.
§18-5-45a. County-wide school calendar committee.
Each county board shall establish a school calendar committee
for the county comprised of no less than six and no more than ten
members who are teachers, administrators or service personnel in
such number as proportionally represents the respective number of
teachers, administrators and service personnel employed in the
county and one member who is the representative of the county
superintendent, selected by the county superintendent. The total
membership of the committee may not be an even number. The
designee of the county superintendent shall chair the committee.
The county superintendent shall determine the number of member
teachers, administrators and service personnel appropriate for
proportional representation of their respective classes of
employment in the county and shall solicit nominations for teachers
and administrators to serve on the school calendar committee from
the faculty senates of the schools of the county and from the
service personnel for service personnel to serve on the committee.
The superintendent shall prepare and distribute the ballots and
tabulate the votes for membership in the manner provided for
professional staff development councils and service personnel staff
development councils pursuant to sections eight and nine, article
three, chapter eighteen-a of this code.
The school calendar committee shall meet no less than three
times each year and shall each year propose at least two school
calendar options for the county. All school calendar options
proposed by the committee shall comply with all applicable provisions of law including, but not limited to, the provisions of
section forty-five of this article. The school calendar options
proposed by the committee shall be presented to the employees of
the county for a county-wide vote. The superintendent shall
prepare and distribute the ballots presenting the options to the
employees for the vote. The voting shall be conducted by a secret
ballot election. Voting is optional to each employee. At least
two representatives from the school calendar committee shall
oversee the counting of returned votes. A simple majority of the
votes returned to the county board constitutes selection of a
school calendar.
If the county board or the state board rejects the school
calendar selected by the majority of the employees in the county,
the school calendar committee shall propose new options for a
calendar for consideration and selection by the employees in the
same manner.
Nothing in this section negates the authority for waivers of
the statutory provisions for school calendars in accordance with
the provisions of article five-b of this chapter, nor precludes the
lawful modification of an adopted school calendar when necessary to
make up cancelled instructional days.
NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to provide for a school
calendar committee in each county comprised of proportional
representation of teachers, administrators and service personnel to
prepare school calendar options selection by a county-wide vote of
the employees. The committee is to be chaired by a representative
of the county superintendent.
This section is new; therefore, it has been completely
underscored.