LIVERMORE FALLS – SAD 36 directors voted 11-1 Thursday to replace Vicki Thayer-Adams’ teaching duties with administrative duties. The vote included transferring Jobs for Maine Graduate teacher Darren Carter’s duties to health and business and hiring a new JMG teacher.

All of the positions are at the high school.

Two years ago, directors approved eliminating the full-time assistant principal position and instead forming a leadership team, which had several teachers serving on it with the principal and one teacher who was appointed as a stipend assistant principal.

That teacher, Thayer-Adams, still taught health and on average provides administrative support 1 periods a day and teaches on average 2 periods per day, high school Principal Shawn Lambert said.

Lambert asked to make some personnel changes since one of two business teachers resigned and some expected feedback from an accreditation team that he suspects will come after them for not having enough guidance counselors to meet student needs.

Lambert said it is recommended that the ratio of students to guidance counselors is 300-to-1. The high school has 347 students enrolled and they are over that ratio, Lambert said.

Lambert said his proposal is not to fill the second business teacher’s position and instead move things around.

He would move Carter, who is a certified health teacher, into a two-thirds health position and one-third business position and change Thayer-Adams’ position to half-time principal and half-time guidance administrator.

It will help address the ratio of students to counselors.

The assistant principal is the building manager and manages most of the disciplinary matters, and he is the education leader, Lambert said.

However, because Thayer-Adams is not consistently available during the school day, the principal handles the bulk of the building management matters and some of the discipline, he said.

“As a result, several initiatives go unaddressed and my ability to focus on instructional leadership is hampered,” Lambert said in written proposal.

This proposal addresses several issues, he said.

“First, by reducing the business position we will streamline our education costs to achieve maximum efficiency,” Lambert said. “Second, by reassigning the assistant principal the management of the building will become much more consistent. The principal will be able to focus on educational leadership and initiatives including dropout prevention.”

This will facilitate a more academic environment consistent with the aspirations goals the school and district has focused on in the last few years, he said.

“Third, by assisting the guidance counselor the school will provide more support for our students and consequently better meet their needs,” he said. “Finally by assisting the guidance counselor we will proactively address what will surely be a noted deficiency by New England Association of Schools and Colleges.”

Lambert said he is aware that this change removes a portion of a teaching position from the classroom and that their goal is to maximize the instructional component of education costs in the district.

“However, one way to maximize the instructional component is to support students effectively so they can be more successful in the classroom. It is my hope that the changes I propose here will do that,” Lambert said.

Both Lambert and Superintendent Terry Despres said the high school leadership team structure needs to be modified, and they recommended that a vacant position not be filled.

Director Denise Rodzen, who voted against the proposal, said she understood the move but where the structure of the leadership team hasn’t been decided she needed time to think about it.