School Board Duties & Responsibilities

Maine state law charges school committees with responsibility to "manage the schools". This is done, essentially by selecting a superintendent and providing him/her with authority & direction. It is not the role of the committee to operate the schools, but to see that they are well operated. The committee concerns itself primarily with broad questions of policy rather than with administrative details. The application of policies is a task to be performed by the administrative leadership team, who shall be held responsible for the effective administration & supervision of the entire school system.

Members of the committee have authority only when acting as a committee legally in session. The committee shall not be bound in any way by an action or statement of an individual member except when such statement or action is in pursuance of specific instructions from the committee.

The position of Superintendent of Schools is created by state law to provide each school committee with the benefit of advice from a professional educator. The state statutes and rules give the superintendent the necessary authority to carry out the responsibilities assigned to him/her in relation to the role assigned to school committees.

Board Meetings

The Raymond School Committee generally meets twice a month on the first and third Wednesday of each month. Meetings are held in the Raymond Elementary School Library. The first Wed. meeting begins at 7pm and is a voting meeting. The meeting on the third Wed. of the month begins at 6:30pm and is a workshop session. Agendas are prepared by the superintendent and committee chair. They are published at least four days in advance of each meeting and are available on the Raymond Website, in each school and in the town office.

*Minutes – The purpose of minutes is to create an official record of actions taken by the board. (They reflect what was done, not all of what was said, at a meeting.) Draft minutes from prior meetings are reviewed for approval at the next regular meeting, so that any corrections may be made in a timely manner.

**Executive Session

In accordance with the Freedom of Access law, committee meetings are held in public. The board may go into private or executive session, upon a vote of the majority of members present, for consideration of certain matters specified in law (i.e. personnel, student suspension/expulsion, collective bargaining, contracts to be negotiated, pending litigation, etc..). No final action may be taken in executive sessions.

Complaints shall be handled and resolved as close as possible to the origin of the concern. Although no member of the community shall be denied the right to petition the school committee for redress of a grievance, the School Board shall refer the complaints back through the proper channels for solution before investigation or action. Exceptions are complaints that concern School Board actions or Board operations only.

Meetings of the school committee are public in the sense that they are held in public. This does not mean they are public meetings in the same sense as a "town meeting". The School Board desires to hear the viewpoints of citizens and also needs to conduct its business in an orderly and efficient manner. To that end, we provide the following thoughts related to your participation as guided by our "Public Participation at School Committee Meetings Policy."