School board approves risk management plan, promotes Bergstrom

Two tragic events — a drowning and alleged bus rapes — in the Wenatchee School District in the last three years have rattled district administrators to make a change; one that Wenatchee School Board President Laura Jaecks calls an all-hands-on-deck situation at district headquarters to update current risk management policies and potentially implement new ones later on. Jaecks said the school atmosphere has to be safe in order to provide a foundation for learning and teaching to occur.

“These tragedies have impacted us each as individuals — we’re human beings,” Jaecks said. For her, it’s been a very emotional experience, one that she hopes never to have to repeat again. “As a body … these experiences have made us much more sensitive and aware of the job that we have to do protecting students in all elements of our operation.”

Last night, the Wenatchee School Board approved Superintendent Brian Flones’ risk management proposal, which was originally presented Nov. 25. It adds a new risk manager position to the district and promotes current Director of Safety and Security Adam Bergstrom to that duty. Bergstrom will review and revise close to 100 risk management and safety policies and procedures throughout the district as an initial task, but will provide ongoing support to the district after that.

“I had background in [policies and procedures] before I came here to the district, and felt that we needed to strengthen the policies and procedures and try to foster a better environment, and this was a way to do it,” Bergstrom said after last night’s approval.

In addition to updating policies, Bergstrom will work in a second capacity to provide ongoing support to the district.

“The risk manager will also be visible out in the schools … working with employees, working with staff, helping with the training, and being kind of eyes and ears to see that things are being implemented,” Flones said.

Executive Director of Human Resources for Wenatchee schools Lisa Turner said this morning that Bergstrom will start his new position Jan. 1.

After the accidental drowning of freshman Antonio Reyes in 2011, Jaecks said the school board had a conversation with Flones about risk management, specifically and immediately related to the pool. After the pool policies and procedures were updated, there was a plan to create a more comprehensive risk management framework for the district.

“We were moving in that direction when the unfortunate incident on the school bus occurred, and that really heightened our awareness, and our motivation to get things done in a more expeditious fashion,” Jaecks said.

Jaecks immediately got to researching — the Washington State School Directors Association, the National School Board Association, the district’s insurance carrier Canfield & Associates, as well as the North Central Educational Service District. Flones did similar research, she said.

The new framework has three components:

—An evaluation of the current policies and procedures. “We will begin an aggressive attack, I’ll say, on evaluating these policies and procedures as quickly as we can get a qualified candidate in the position,” Jaecks said.

—An audit or accountability review to ensure appropriate and thorough training for district staff.

—A continuous plan that won’t stop after the initial policies and procedures are updated. Policies will continue to be evaluated for possible revision.

It’s expected to cost $173,226 to promote Bergstrom, hire a new school resource officer contracted through the Wenatchee Police Department, and a secretary for Bergstrom. The board had two options, and approved the cheaper of the two. It was less by about $10,000. The second option instead would have added a risk manager position and a secretary, but not a school resource officer. It would have left Bergstrom in his current director of safety and security position.

“When we’re talking about students and their safety, to speak in terms of dollars is pretty much offensive to me,” Jaecks said.

While researching other districts in Washington and across the country, Flones discovered a comprehensive model for risk management was hard to find. A framework wasn’t already out there, so the district plan includes six key categories of facilities and property protection, employee and workers’ compensation, safety and loss control, emergency management, student management, and risk controls and accountability. “It’s pretty comprehensive and I feel really good about it,” Flones said.

“I think that risk management of any school district, let alone a school district of the size of the Wenatchee School District is vitally important for student safety, and for any type of safety,” Wenatchee High School Principal Bob Celebrezze said. “I don’t think you can have too tight of procedures for risk management.”

Training might also have to occur to ensure teachers are fully aware of any change in policy or procedure. Wenatchee Education Association President Kris Cameron said although teachers already have a ton of policies to keep up with, safety is most important.

“Teachers and professional educators right now are so inundated with new policies, new procedures, new requirements,” Cameron said, “we really are regulated to death. And I think that we’re suffering from some initiative fatigue, however I believe that student and staff safety is such a high priority for everyone that I think most people would be more willing to put more time in to training around those issues than perhaps some other things that we have to deal with that aren’t as immediate in their impact.”

The school board will be involved heavily in the process, Jaecks said, because all of the policies will have to be approved after being revised. The process might also involve some legal work, she said.

“This is going to be built into our culture, we’re going to be raising the awareness of safety throughout, and it is something that’s going to be permanently embedded in the culture of the Wenatchee School District,” Jaecks said.

For the next year, the school board plans to approve more than one new policy and/or procedure at each meeting, after securing a person for the risk manager position, Jaecks said.

“What I hope to see out of this is that no stone is left unturned. That any possible risk scenario that we could imagine for the students in our district is somehow covered in those policies — but not just the policies. It has to go through to what is our staff doing … it needs to include everyone,” Jaecks said. “We all have to know what’s going to happen in certain scenarios and be ready to proactively plan to avoid any potential damage to person or property in the future.”

Editor’s Note: At the time of Laura Jaecks’ interview, she served as president of the school board. Walter Newman was elected as president of the board at last night’s meeting.