The leader of the largest school district in the state and the fifth largest in the country wants to resign.

Why and what comes next?

That's this week on Nevada Week.

♪♪♪ Support for Nevada Week is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt.

-Welcome to Nevada Week.

I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

Clark County School District Superintendent Dr. Jesus Jara wants to step down, but on certain conditions.

The CCSD Board of Trustees says that on February 7, trustees will consider ending his contract sooner than its expiration date of June 2026.

So what's behind all this?

There are varying viewpoints, which we'll explore now with Rocio Hernandez, a Reporter for The Nevada Independent; and April Corbin Girnus, Deputy Editor at Nevada Current.

And before we begin, for the sake of transparency, I want to acknowledge that our FCC license here at Vegas PBS is held by the Clark County School District Board of School Trustees and that, April, you are married to a teacher in the Clark County School District.

But Rocio, I want to start with you.

You broke this news of the Superintendent's desire to resign.

The big question is why does he want to?

(Rocio Hernandez) Yeah.

The letter that went public yesterday doesn't really give a specific reason for why he's looking to resign.

In fact, in the past, we've heard him, you know, get called out, and people have called for his resignation.

And he's always been consistently saying that he wants to stay with the District, he wants to continue his work.

So this reversal could be-- I mean, there's a lot of theories out there, but they're just that, theories.

Some people kind of link it to a recent death that he had in his family.

The teachers union today linked it to pending litigation that they have against him.

But there's not really a definitive answer from him or the District on the reasoning behind this.

-It's a question we would love to ask him ourselves.

We have reached out to the Clark County School District to get a response, but they are not commenting at this time.

Any other reason you think why he might be resigning?

(April Corbin Girnus) You know, there could be-- who knows?

We don't know.

That's the thing.

It's funny because a lot of the time when you see resignations like this of high-level individuals, they'll say "for personal reasons," which is like really vague.

The fact that he hasn't even said that is kind of interesting.

So that's the question on everyone's minds.

And assuming he addresses the Board on Wednesday, maybe he'll give us more then.

But so far, all we have is theories.

-Okay.

And that is when the Board will be deciding whether to grant him-- -Yes.

- --that resignation.

The buyout, that is part of the headline, your headline.

It reads, "Jesus Jara, Embattled Clark County Superintendent, to Ask for Buyout from School Board."

What does the buyout include?

-So he's looking for the Board to approve an amendment to his contract, which would grant him at least one year's worth of a salary.

And that's about $400,000 per his last raise.

He's also looking for a couple of additional benefits and perks along with that.

So he did say in his letter that his resignation is contingent on the Board's approval of this buyout.

So if the Board decides, you know, next week that they don't want to pass this, I don't know where that leaves the District and Jara and the School Board.

-Yeah, whether he will remain as the Superintendent.

In a statement, the Board of Trustees did indicate they are open to the buyout.

The statement reads, in part, quote, This decision is being considered due to the mutual benefit of both parties, recognizing that CCSD is in the strongest possible position to consider this transition.

This is a natural transition point as the District embarks on revising our five-year plan, which is set to expire this year.

I'd like to break that down a bit.

This resignation being a "mutual benefit of both parties," is that, We have this five-year plan.

It's coming to a close soon.

This is good timing, convenient timing.

Or is there more to it than that?

-Well, I think it's worth noting that we haven't had much talk.

We haven't heard much talk about the five-year plan.

Like obviously, it's something that's existed, but, you know, leading up to the announcement of the resignation, it's not something we saw sort of publicly talked about.

So it seems-- it's reading to a lot of people as sort of an excuse or a reason that's been given.

It seems kind of out of left field for a lot of people.

I think that given the climate of CCSD, the, you know, mutually beneficial thing, I think most people understand that to be that there's been a lot of pushback on Superintendent Jara.

I think we've had the, you know, state legislative leaders both on the House-- or the Assembly and the Senate call for his resignation.

You have the teachers union calling for his resignation.

I think the principals have had a vote of no confidence in him at some point.

Like there's been a lot of pushback on that.

So, you know, who's it beneficial for, I guess, is the broader question.

-Speaking of the teachers union, the Clark County Education Association held a press conference to respond to the resignation desires of the Superintendent, and let's take a listen to some of what was said.

(John Vellardita) What is about to happen next Wednesday is not simply a narrative of a bad actor, in other words, a failed Superintendent.

There's something more systemic that's wrong with the School District.

And now the attention shifts to these trustees who, on the one hand, have enabled this bad leadership, but, on the other hand, they're on the eve of cutting a deal, a deal that's going to pay this guy a lot of money and not going to hold him accountable for things that we think are grounds for his discharge.

-Again, we have reached out to the School District to get a response to what was said there.

They are not commenting at this time.

And we're going to talk more about their reasoning for a potential discharge or firing the Superintendent ahead.

But first, a possible replacement for the Superintendent is already being talked about, Rocio.

Who is it, and how soon could this person take the role?

-So according to the agenda that was released for the Board meeting next week, they're considering Brenda Larsen-Mitchell, the Deputy Superintendent, to serve as, what the agenda reads, as Superintendent.

And we've asked the District to clarify whether this is an appointment that's going to be permanent or if it's going to be an interim while the District conducts a search, as other districts typically do in the meantime while they're trying to deal with the resignation of a Superintendent, looking for a new one.

And that's just not clear.

And that's part of the union's concerns about why this is being pushed through and potentially being labeled as "permanent" immediately and, really, right after we hear for the first time publicly of Jara's desire to resign.

-Your thoughts of a lack of interim in that wording?

-It would be highly unusual.

If you look at other school districts, if you look at higher ed, really, if you look at most positions of that level, even if the interim person ends up being the permanent solution or the permanent Superintendent, they're almost always the interim person, in general.

I think that that's partially for logistics if you have to do a search, but also just because most people agree that the Superintendent, there should be some public input and that process goes in there.

This-- the transitions usually happen where they will say, All right, the Superintendent is leaving.

And then we'll have a discussion with stakeholders, the community, parents, and teachers to ask them what they want from a Superintendent.

They'll decide, the Board will usually decide if they want to hire internally or externally and do a national search.

Those are processes that theoretically might be sort of bypassed if they are intending next week to hire the Deputy Superintendent in a permanent position, but we don't know that.

They haven't clarified, the District hasn't clarified.

-All right.

So the teachers union at that press conference, another clip to show you, they are also questioning the timing of this resignation.

Let's listen to that.

(Marie Neisess) And what's suspicious about the timing of this is February 5 is the deadline for the Superintendent's attorney to hand over his Twitter account.

We believe that that information would be vital for the trustees.

And then yet on February 7, they're considering buying him out.

We do not believe he should be bought out.

We believe that they should wait for the evidence, the evidence that would prove that Superintendent Jara did put out that misogynistic tweet.

-That alleged "misogynistic tweet," let me attempt to explain what that's about.

So it came from an account with the Superintendent's name and face on it.

And whoever wrote that tweet called the woman we just heard from, Marie Neisess, she's the president of the teachers union, called her the "mistress" of "Crooked JV."

JV being the initials of John Vellardita, the Executive Director of CCEA.

Rocio, how has the School District responded to this allegation?

-I mean, it's a common theme that we're having.

We have not really heard anything from the School District on, you know, Did this tweet come from the Superintendent's official account?

Was it part of a hacking?

Around this time, we also had gotten news that the District was hacked.

But there hasn't been any indication that that was a hack or it wasn't.

I will say that when the post was posted on X, or tweet, I don't know what we're calling it nowadays, it was screenshotted by a union member.

And we looked for trails to see if you could identify whether it was indeed a post from the Superintendent's official account.

There should be like maybe a link somewhere.

There should be like a note that says that it was deleted.

There really was no concrete evidence that it was or wasn't real.

There's a lot of speculation on whether it is or is not.

I think some internet detectives have kind of like looked at the mannerisms of that tweet and looked at mannerisms related to an alleged burner account by the Superintendent and his District communication.

And they've kind of put two and two together.

But until we get that concrete evidence that she's referencing, we won't know.

So the union is asking for the court to compel the District to release records of this Superintendent's social media accounts.

And those are pending to come by as early as two days before the Board meeting to discuss the termination of the Superintendent.

So that's why the union is questioning right now the timing of all of this, Is this all just a convenient timing, you know, to get ahead of the potential release of these records?

But you know, that's all speculative, and nothing's certain right now.

-In that week, this upcoming week, there is also another important meeting on February 8, I believe, of the Interim Finance Committee.

What will be determined there in relation to the Clark County School District?

-Yeah.

So the Interim Finance meeting, which met last, I think, two months ago, they-- right before Christmas, actually.

So a month ago.

The Interim Finance Committee, which is made up of state lawmakers who make financial decisions when the session isn't going on, they were agendized to approve SB 231 funds, which was this like special fund created to give staff and teachers raises.

And CCSD submitted their plan for support staff, and the IFC decided to table that and not take a vote on it.

And their, the reason that they gave was that CCSD needed to have a contract and have a plan for their teachers also.

So they said, Hey, we're supposed to, you know, we're supposed to-- we intended to do these together.

CCSD has pushed back and said, No, you never said that.

But lawmakers sort of stuck to that and said, No, we want both of those two things to happen.

So in between then and now, right before Christmas, the CCSD and CCEA settled a contract that has been approved.

They have a plan for those SB 231 funds.

And that meeting is also scheduled, so IFC will again hear from them.

So prior to the resignation announcement, a lot of us that follow the IFC were wondering whether or not Jara would show up to that meeting, because during the last meeting, IFC was sort of, really grilled CCSD, sort of vague like, and said, Why is Jara not here?

Why is he not addressing us?

And CCSD gave some reason.

Again, I asked, and I know others did, what that reason was.

They never sort of disclosed what the exact reason was, but he didn't show up to that.

So again, they'll have that decision.

So we'll see.

-Okay, that's coming up.

SB 231, we're going to talk about that ahead.

But first, the announcement of this resignation comes after tense negotiations between the School District and the Clark County Education Association, the teachers union.

So those negotiations resulted in an 18% pay raise for teachers over two years, which is what the union has been wanting.

However, there are certain CCSD teachers who are not happy with this contract.

Why is that Rocio?

-Well, while the 18% increase, I don't think the teachers are saying that this is necessarily a bad thing, but there is language in the contract that creates a new salary schedule.

And I think that's the most contentious part of what's leaving veteran teachers feeling left out.

It doesn't adequately place them into the salary schedule.

And that means that they could be making about the same or even less than a new teacher would be making compared to their years of experience or the level of education.

So veteran teachers are feeling discouraged by this pay disparity that potentially leaves them, you know, feeling like, why did I put in all this time, all this effort, and all the education that they receive, whether they go back to school or whether they get credits.

That's all time and money that they've spent already.

And so to see that another teacher is coming in, potentially fresh into the District and making about the same as them or even more is discouraging for them.

I've heard a lot of veteran teachers questioning, Why should I stay here at this district?

Or even saying that there's a clause that allows them to leave the district for a certain amount of years and then come back, be placed on this new salary schedule.

And so I think a lot of the concern is, well, if veteran teachers are discouraged and decide to go that route, will that exacerbate the shortage that the District is already facing?

-Anything to add?

I keep hearing you go, "mm-hmm."

-It's an issue that has gotten a lot of attention.

Obviously, the new salary schedule that Rocio talked about is good for new teachers.

I think it's attractive to teachers who want to relocate into the state, obviously is intended to help fix our teacher shortage.

And I think they, you know, that was the priority really of CCEA and CCSD during the whole negotiations and during the legislative session.

Like, we all know there's a teacher vacancy, and they're trying to fix that.

But unfortunately, it didn't seem like they could do that and also sort of move all of the new teachers-- or all of the current teachers who've been in the district over there.

So they feel a little shorted.

-And how has the School District explained this?

And the teachers union as well?

-You know, CCEA has-- there's been some releases, or people have showed communications they've had with the union who've just kind of said, Well, you signed your contract.

You're on that contract, and that's how things go.

Join our union and try to help make a difference and be a part of the role.

They've kind of, you know, said that, and they've also pushed back sort of really bluntly and said, Hey, you're getting an 18% raise.

You know, that's pretty good.

That's on par with a lot of the other districts and a lot of the other state employees we've seen getting big raises.

It's not insignificant.

Nobody's saying that.

They're saying, Be happy with what you have, and look at the greater good, which is what we're trying to do.

-That's what the union is saying?

-Yes, what they've told their members.

-And what about the School District?

-Well, I will say that a lot of this is hearsay, because none of us were at the bargaining table.

So we don't know exactly what was said and what wasn't said.

And so the School District throughout the contract negotiations did occasionally release updates about how things are progressing.

And one of the updates they shared that they had proposed, somebody called "a lookback," which would have addressed those salary compaction issues.

And when I've asked the union if they had supported that proposal, the union says it was never a genuine proposal, that the District kind of threw it in there to wedge, like wedge a divide between veteran teachers and new teachers.

And that's when the union asked them in earnest to work on that proposal and better it, that the District kind of pushed back against it, and it was never brought up again.

I know that the Superintendent in a recent Las Vegas Sun story has been calling for greater transparency in the bargaining negotiations and asking that they be public so that everyone's on the same table and we all know exactly what's being thrown out there.

I don't know if that'll happen.

But I do know that a lot of this stuff is just like, we have to take their word for it that this actually, these conversations actually did happen.

-There are other pay raises included in this new deal.

One, for example, a payment of $5,000 for special education staff and licensed staff at Title I schools with a vacancy rate of 5% or higher.

How is all of this being funded?

-The majority of it is funded through the base per-pupil funding mechanism, like the general fund.

We've heard a lot of talk about that SB 231 and a special fund.

But it's important to remember that that's a small portion of that, like the 2.5, or whatever it was, billion dollar education budget.

Most of that is funding all of this thing.

And there was a huge increase in that, the education budget in general.

So that's funding all of these extra things.

-And I bring up SB 231 because there was such a debate about it.

Let's be clear, though, was this debate across school districts in Nevada about how to use SB 231, or was it just happening within the Clark County School District?

-It was largely just the teachers union.

It was just-- it was largely CCEA saying that the money could be used to permanently raise salaries and the base salary, rather than that.

We didn't hear a lot of public statements from some of the other leaders across the state.

But in terms of them putting in applications for SB 231 funds, they all put in sunset clauses in that.

So they sort of accepted that as part of it.

So it was really just CCEA.

When John Vellardita was asked about it, he was like pretty much point blank said, I don't care what other unions are doing.

We think this is how it should be used, and that's how it should be used.

They really were the outlier in terms of how to use that.

-Okay.

Because CCEA said, You can use that matching fund from SB 231 to fund teacher raises.

And the School District was countering what?

-They were saying that these 231 monies, the way they're written is they're supposed to sunset at the end of 2025.

And without any real commitment from lawmakers that this money will be renewed, they didn't see it as fiscally responsible to have raises permanently funded through SB 231 dollars.

But during last year, during the contract negotiations, we did see lawmakers say, No, absolutely.

Like, These funds we intentionally gave to the districts, and there should be like-- there should be an expectation that these will be continued just like any other funding that we appropriate during the biennium.

They said that, you know, any funding that we appropriate during the biennium, there's never a 100% guarantee.

But there's always like this expectation that we will continue this funding in the future, so you should give the raises the way the teachers union is asking for them.

-So there is a sunset clause, then-- -There is, yes, on that.

- --on CCSD's contract?

-Yeah.

-Okay.

They have determined how they will address whether those funds are not renewed-- -Yes.

- --during the next legislative session?

-There's language in there, or at least in the releases that both the District and the union have put out, saying that they will work together to try and find a permanent solution for that in the legislature.

So we'll have to wait and see till next year.

-Okay.

So back to the teachers union, the union is pursuing a change to state law.

What does the union want in terms of--let me give you some more information--a teacher's ability to strike?

-Yes.

So we saw a lot of-- while contract negotiations were sort of not going well all throughout last year, we saw a spate of teacher sickouts, which is when a lot of, a bunch of teachers all at one school called out sick, which effectively shuts down the school because they don't have the staff.

That was in six or so schools, just a handful of schools.

CCSD sued and took them to court and said, Hey, this constitutes a strike under Nevada state law.

CCEA sort of argued that it doesn't because we are not pushing this, even though they sort of made comments to the general effect.

The court sided with the District and said, This is a strike.

You need to stop this immediately.

That really essentially did stop all of the strikes or sickouts.

But then more recently, CCEA has announced that they are doing an initiative petition to get enough signatures to push to make-- to give teachers the right to strike here in Nevada.

So it would just be them.

So currently, state law bars any public employee from shrinking.

CCEA's proposal is to allow teachers and support staff and other licensed professionals.

So it's people that are in their union and support staff.

So that would be the change.

But it's something that we may not, we wouldn't see this election cycle or anything.

This is like a two-year process.

-But it would impact all public employees in the state?

-No.

This would just be public, just public teachers.

-Just public teachers.

-Yes.

-That's interesting, because the current law impacts all.

-Yes.

-Okay.

The union has argued that had they had the right to strike during these negotiations, that maybe they would have reached a conclusion quicker.

How has this also contributed to teacher vacancies, if at all?

-I think that-- CCEA had said in their press conference announcing their initiative that, I think it was like 400 teachers, somewhere in the ballpark of 400 teachers, had left the district between the time negotiation started with CCSD to the time that they settled in December.

So you lost 400 teachers or so in the span of a year.

So their question is how many of those 400 people would not have left if we had provided 18% raises and, you know, $5,000 extra per year for SPED and all of those things that they got in their contract?

If they had gotten them earlier, would that have prevented some of those 400 people, 400 people from leaving?

And I think that prolonged contract negotiation really takes a toll on employee morale.

And I think that's what they're saying, where they're saying, you know, if you give us the right to strike, the negotiation process will be much shorter, and that will help keep teachers motivated and staying in classroom and not have to worry about whether or not they're not going to get a raise or anything, because you have to remember the history of CCSD is really, you know, there's a lot of veteran teachers, especially, who dealt with years and years of freezes and salary, you know, all of these issues, that if we could shorten that period, will it help?

-However, if teachers are allowed to strike, what impact could that have on students?

-Yeah.

So the union has said that they would do their best to mitigate any unintended consequences; that they would give, you know, parents a heads up that this is coming; that they would work to make sure that students who depend on schools to get lunches or breakfasts, you know, continue to get those; and, you know, keep in constant communication with parents.

But that remains to be seen.

And I think it could depend on if they have the right to strike, how long would the strikes drag out?

It's still a loss, potentially, of instructional time for students.

And we know that, after the pandemic, all the instructional time is crucial.

So I think the union would argue that the unintended consequences kind of outweigh the benefits and that the urgency right now is to keep teachers happy and keep teachers in the district and get more teachers in so that way we can reduce these classroom sizes and get the students their instructional time and get them one-on-one support.

-How is the teacher vacancy situation at the moment?

-Not good.

If anybody watching wants to be a teacher, they'll hire you if you're qualified.

It's-- it's a tough thing because, you know, we're a large district, and especially given economic conditions where housing has gone up.

We've seen that.

We've all felt that.

Inflation has gone up.

I think people are harder pressed to want to move here and become teachers.

I think teacher vacancies are an issue all across the nation.

There are less education majors across the universities.

There's, you know, those teacher pipelines are an issue everywhere.

And it's going to be exacerbated in an area like Nevada, like Southern Nevada, specifically, and Northern Nevada, where the population is growing.

And we need more teachers, and we're already losing teachers.

So it is an uphill battle, even independent of the drama and stuff that's going on with the District.

But it's an ongoing challenge.

It doesn't seem like we're better off than we were.

-Okay.

April Corbin Girnus and Rocio Hernandez, thank you for joining Nevada Week.

And thank you for watching.

I'll see you next week on Nevada Week.

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