The Valparaiso City Council has opened the application process for appointing a new member to the Valparaiso School Board.
“The applications are available online March 1,” said Valparaiso City Council Member Emilie Hunt, D-At-large, who serves as the council liaison for Valparaiso schools.
“There’s a member whose term is expiring and the school board currently includes two appointees who are considered Republicans and two appointees who are considered Democrats. So for the 2024 school board appointment process, applicants can be either political party affiliation.”
The application is available at https://www.ci.valparaiso.in.us/978/School-Board-Member-Appointment-Process.
Applications are due by noon on April 12, and interviewing will begin in May. Applicants must be at least 21 years old and live within Valparaiso city limits, with state statute requiring that the Valparaiso School Board have at least one member from each political party. “Party affiliation” is determined by the last primary in which the applicant voted. The term of appointment for the new member is four years.
From April 12-26, the public can submit interview questions via the city hall website.
If four or fewer applications are received, all applicants will be interviewed. If more than four applications are received, the city council will meet in executive session at 6 p.m. on April 25 to select the four applicants to be interviewed and reduce the applicant pool to four.
On April 26, applicants will be notified of their May 6 interview time, and selected public-generated questions will be sent to applicants by May 3.
Before the council interviews, all applicants will receive questions that will be asked at the first interview. All provided questions are the same for each applicant, with the exception of an applicant who is an incumbent school board member. An incumbent will receive modified questions to reflect their current role on the school board.
Each of the interviews will be 25 minutes, with council members also allowed to ask one follow-up question if time permits.
The first round of interviews using a panel format is at 6 p.m. May 6 at Valparaiso City Hall.
By May 17, a selection of the council’s potential questions will be sent to applicants in preparation for the 6 p.m. May 20 interviews conducted by the members of the city council.
Valparaiso City Attorney Patrick Lyp said the panel and interview portion during the second round of interviews will be limited to 90 minutes, with guidelines still to be determined for applicants’ allowed response time.
After a 10-minute recess following the second round of interviews, council members will reconvene to appoint a school board member with each council member voting for one name for consideration on a ballot.
After Lyp counts the ballots, if there is a majority vote for one candidate, the name of the candidate is nominated and seconded, with discussion following about the merits of the candidate. Following discussion, a vote will be taken and the selection made.
If there is no majority vote for the candidate, according to the guiding procedure, a council member can then make a motion to consider two candidates. After discussion, a motion to select one candidate will be made and seconded with additional discussion followed by a final vote.
Philip Potempa is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
