School Board Revisits Policy & Criteria for Non-Curricular Clubs

by Leslie Lytle, Messenger Staff Writer

Anticipating another large crowd, the Franklin County Board of Education met on March 14 at the Franklin County High School. Contrary to what many expected, there was no motion on the issue of school clubs, and therefore no vote on the hotly contested topic. The board had spent a significant portion of its March 7 working session discussing a “closed-forum” policy that would ban all non-curricular school clubs at the secondary level. 

“I do not believe the majority of the board supports such a drastic measure,” said school board member Adam Tucker, who represents Sewanee, Sherwood and Keith Springs Mountain.

At the March 7 working session, board member Sarah Liechty pointed to dire consequences if the Franklin County schools banned non-curricular clubs: “Over 1,100 students would be impacted, as well as over 80 organizations which use school facilities.”

The federal Equal Access Act of 1985 prohibits discrimination when schools allow non-curricular clubs. To avoid losing federal funding, a school system must allow all non-curricular clubs or it must prohibit all non-curricular clubs. Outside FCHS prior to the March 14 board meeting, students and community members displayed signs and banners asking the school system to keep an open-forum policy on clubs.

Inside at the meeting, the board did not revisit the closed-forum concept and instead focused on less radical policy revisions and administrative procedures pertaining to clubs.

Board Chair Kevin Caroland suggested that the school clubs policy could require parental permission for a student to join a club. Board members Cleijo Walker and Chris Guess agreed.

Tucker said the current “opt-out” policy already allowed parents to prohibit their children’s participation in a club. He argued an “opt-in” policy could create difficulty for students when divorced parents disagreed and in any circumstance where parents are not active participants in their child’s life. “We need to be expanding extracurricular opportunities, not creating obstacles that discourage participation,” Tucker said. 

Weighing in on the discussion, school system attorney Chuck Cagle said a law now under consideration by the Tennessee legislature would require parental permission for student participation in a club. Caroland also suggested revising the policy to require the director of schools join with school principals in approving formation of a club, a decision which at present falls to school principals alone. Cagle pointed out that the director of schools was already involved in the decision-making process as the supervisor of school principals.

The board also reviewed a newly created administrative procedures document that details the criteria for school clubs.

“The purpose of administrative procedures is to implement policy,” Tucker explained. “[Director of Schools Amie] Lonas is seeking the board’s input. The board will not vote on the [administrative procedures] document.”

Tucker suggested several revisions to the criteria, including more lenient standards in how students can publicize clubs, allowing students time to find a new faculty advisor if the current advisor resigned and allowing students to appeal to the director of schools if their application to form a club is denied.

Tucker also took issue with “the undue administrative burden on faculty advisors in terms of documenting club activities.” Prior to the board meeting, the advisors for the National Honor Society and Beta Club sent board members an email saying they would not serve as a club sponsor next year if the onerous documentation procedures proposed were adopted. 

Caroland recommended adding the stipulation that a club could be disbanded for failing to adhere to the criteria outlined in the administrative procedures. Cagle advised including in the policy a provision for disbanding clubs, as well as an appeals process in the event a club is disbanded.

In discussion about the requirement that 10 students were needed to form a club, Tucker noted that some clubs now in existence have as few as six members. Board member Gary Hanger recommended a club with five or fewer members be disbanded.

Turning to the application to form a club, which is also an administrative procedures document, Caroland asked Lonas to include a parental permission requirement. 

The board will likely continue its considerations of extracurricular clubs at its April 4 working session and April 7 board meeting. 

In other business, Lonas said the first round of student achievement testing “went better than expected.” She will consult with school principals on possible changes to procedures to facilitate the next round of testing scheduled for the first week in May.

Lonas expressed concern because the school system expected to receive $1.2 million from the state for teacher salary increases, but the amount was reduced by $926,000, the amount of stability funding the school received last year. (Stability funding is the monies received by a school system when its enrollment falls below the anticipated level.) Lonas hopes the school system will receive stability funding again this year, but cautioned the additional support will eventually be withdrawn if enrollment continues to decline.