The Smith County Education Association (SCEA) sponsored a School Board Candidate Forum on July 8, 2008 at the Smith County Chamber of Commerce Building. All candidates were invited to attend. Candidates were: Karen Shoulders, District 1 (opposition not present); Dick Fulton and Chris McCall, District 2; Sonja Hammonds, District 7 (current board member not present) and Tommy Manning (running unopposed) from District 5. Each candidate made an opening and closing statement.
Questions that had been submitted by members of SCEA were presented to the candidates concerning: open meetings, rotating Board of Education (BOE) meetings to different schools, their favorite teacher and subject, evaluations of the Director of Schools, his job extensions and taking applications for the position, changing board policies and opening board policy up to the public or posting it on line. Mr. Manning expressed surprise that the board policy was not on line since the BOE had paid the Tenn. School Board Association to do so a couple of years ago. Several candidates also expressed new ideas to add to the effectiveness of the Smith County Board of Education. All the candidates present spoke positively about the schools, students and teachers of Smith County.
The Smith County Education Association hopes to continue forums in the future to help promote awareness of education in Smith County .
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