Teachers Lament Exodus From FPS At Board Meeting

By Gordon HopkinsThe Fairbury Board of Education accepted the resignations of five teachers, previously reported by FJN, at a meeting Monday evening, April 14, 2025. Some FPS teachers, both current and former, as well as one parent, expressed their dismay that so many teachers have opted not to remain with the district.To date, 25 FPS staff members have resigned during this school year. Prior to the meeting, FPS Superintendent Dr. Devin Embray advised FJN that the majority of those positions had already been filled. At the meeting, the board approved the hiring of seven new teachers.As happened at the last board of education meeting, which took place in March, the meeting was held in the gymnasium of the 47 Building rather in the conference room due to the large crowd of approximately 75 people. Four teachers, all of whom had resigned, spoke during the public comment portion of the meeting, including Grace Ellis, who was hired in 2022 and submitted her resignation this year, indicating it had always been her intention to remain at FPS, “I have chosen to leave Fairbury not because of difficult students, low pay, better opportunities, or because I use this district as a stepping stone. When I accepted the position here, it was always with the intent of staying for my entire career. I'm leaving because I fear that the sour relationship between teachers and those in charge of us would have turned me away from education entirely, had I stayed for another year. I'm leaving because the words and decisions coming from Dr. Embray and the school board show how little you know and understand the staff that you work with.”Ellis said, “I firmly believe that there is a prominent disconnect between our staff, our school board, our superintendent and our community. This disconnect has led to a grotesque misrepresentation of the educators who love, serve, coach, teach and help raise our community's children.”Emily Winter, who also recently resigned, reiterated a complaint made by several other teachers over the past year, that the school board opted to hire an outside company to draw up a new curriculum, “You spend tens of thousands of dollars a year for CLI (Curriculum Leadership Institute), which is an out of state curriculum company. The superintendent sits on the board of directors for the same curriculum, work that our ESU (Nebraska Educational Service Units) has and will do for free, all while cutting classroom budgets this year, which could not more directly impact students.”CLI is a non-profit curriculum consulting organization headquartered in McPherson, Kansas. FJN confirmed that Embray is on the board of directors of CLI.After the meeting, Embray responded to some of the issues raised, “First, regarding our partnership with the Curriculum Leadership Institute (CLI): I did not bring CLI to the district. This work began under the leadership of Karen Dux, who was our curriculum director at the time and who is now graciously serving as a fifth-grade teacher. Ms. (Karen) Dux researched CLI and presented it to the strategic planning committee. I was transparent with the committee, stating that I serve—without compensation—on the CLI board of directors in a volunteer capacity, much like school board members serve their communities. I recused myself from voting on the matter.”“Despite my abstaining, the committee chose to have CLI present to them. Following that presentation, the Curriculum and American Civics board subcommittee—composed of Jacie Milius, Jonathan Winter, and Andrea Schmidt—reviewed the proposal and unanimously recommended moving forward. The full board approved the partnership in December 2024, following several months of discussion, evaluation, and collaboration,” wrote Embray in an email. “Some have asked why we did not pursue curriculum development with ESU5. While we value our partnership with ESU5, they do not currently have the capacity to develop curriculum at the scale and pace required to meet our district’s goal of completing all curriculum cycles—major and minor—within a four-year period—because our students deserve this process to be completed in the shortest amount of time that our staff can accomplish it. That includes writing, validating, and assessing curriculum, along with aligning/purchasing resources. CLI brings an established process that builds internal capacity. Their model is designed to eventually make themselves unnecessary, enabling our district to take full ownership of the work moving forward. However, ESU5 staff are on board to assist us with this process as we are not excluding them.”Embray added, “Regarding the budget: There was no district-level directive to cut classroom budgets. What occurred at the Jr./Sr. High was a correction to a building spreadsheet that had reflected more funding than was ever allocated. A proportional reduction was applied to reconcile the figures, and when it became apparent that the adjustment unintentionally impacted teachers who used the instructional supply budgets to fund curricular things—such as those used for science labs—those amounts were restored.”

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