Lorain Schools interim CEO ends one vendor contract, reviewing others

LORAIN — The interim CEO is still reviewing vendor contracts and has severed ties with at least one company. Greg Ring said at Monday's school board meeting the district has severed the contract with Kickboard and is reviewing its contact with Achievement Network, or ANet. He said ANet could end this school year. "We're looking at those (contracts) on a case-by-case basis as those come forward," he said. Kickboard was used to collect data on student behavior, with information supposed to be included on student report cards. It was implemented under former CEO David Hardy Jr., and there were questions as to whether he was tied to the company. According to a 2018 news release from the New Orleans-based group, Hardy wrote a white paper titled "Developing an Action Plan to Improve Classroom Attendance" that was published by Kickboard. When the district started using the system in 2018, it did not pay for the product. Instead, according to an email from Kickboard CEO Stefan Kohler sent to the Chronicle-Telegram in December 2018, the company partnered with Lorain Schools "as a research opportunity to continually improve our district-wide behavior platform and professional development." Ring said after Monday's meeting he'd heard feedback from staff that they liked ClassDojo to track similar data before the Kickboard rollout. ANet is a nonprofit consultant firm providing student assessments four times a year. Ring said feedback from staff — especially at the elementary level — said students are tested too much. He plans to release a report on findings from his listening sessions with staff and the community later this week. Contact Carissa Woytach at (440) 329-7245 or cwoytach@chroniclet.com.