D158 interim superintendent makes her BOE meeting debut with some school year updates

HUNTLEY — At the July 20 Huntley Community School District 158 (D158) Board of Education (BOE) meeting, Jessica Lombard, the district’s interim superintendent for the upcoming school year, officially made her debut.

As previously reported, Lombard, before her current role, had served as the district’s associate superintendent since 2018. She was appointed to her new position after former D158 Superintendent Dr. Scott Rowe announced that he had accepted a job as the superintendent for the Arlington Heights-based Northwest High School District 214.

“I can’t express just how honored and privileged I feel to be sitting up here today (July 20) in the role of interim superintendent for the school year,” Lombard told attendees of the BOE meeting.

She continued, “As you all know [this] is my 23rd year in the district. [I] called it home as a student and a graduate and so the staff and the families and the community here are pretty special to me…I truly believe that there is no greater collective of individuals than we find here in District 158 and that goes for the staff. It goes for the administration. It goes for the board and the community and the families and most importantly, our students.”

Following her opening statement, Lombard explained that the Human Resources department has been busy throughout the summer months as D158 can expect to welcome around 60 new staff members in the upcoming school year.

According to Lombard, the district will hold an orientation for new staff on Aug. 10-11, with existing staff expected to return shortly after.

Updates for the Operations and Maintenance Department followed, which included news about projects that are continuing to move forward despite the heavy storms that have come through the area. Lombard added that D158 will be “ready to go with all of those things for the start of the school year.”

As for the situation on transportation, Lombard told attendees of the July 20 BOE meeting that while the district is not fully hired yet in this area, D158 is continuously working through those cases to have some consistency so families can have ridership information available to them.

Lombard then moved on to updates regarding the Technology Department, where she highlighted a Digital Equity Grant that the district will use alongside some funding that was set aside to order new Chromebooks to replace older ones as well as obtain some new software that will be introduced for students and staff in the new school year.

“Our Teaching and Learning Department has been doing so much. We’ve had some turnover and changes in there…We have a full week of a variety of meetings with our district leadership teams and making sure that we are ready for those staff when they walk through that door on [Aug.] 14 and 15,” said Lombard.

As a final update, Lombard told attendees that due to personnel changes in the Technology Department, the district is still needing to finalize plans on Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, as a new individual is needed to fill the role to handle those requests. Further information on this topic is expected to be discussed in a future BOE meeting, said Lombard.

“We’ve had a lot of change in this district in a short amount of time. We’ve had change with the board. We’ve had change with the superintendent. We will have some change in our district cabinet level and some administrative positions as well,” Lombard said in her closing remarks. “Change can be pretty exciting when we allow it to be and so by shifting that mindset, we can see the benefits that change brings. That change brings growth. It brings flexibility. It brings new perspectives and approaches. It brings strength and progress and opportunities and as we as a collective whole embrace these benefits of the change that’s coming upon us and has come upon us, I just think about the opportunities that we have to take our already great district even further.”

Additionally, Lombard stated that she hopes that she can give new and existing D158 staff comfortability during this new transition period as the district prepares to welcome approximately 8,400 students for the 2023-24 school year.