New school board member appointed

The school board of Sweetwater County School District No. 2 voted Tuesday evening to appoint Daniel Flom to fill a vacated seat on the board. The term runs through November and Flom will need to run for election this fall to keep his seat beyond that point. Two other seats on the school board will also be on the general election ballot this year. The filing period for those seats began Wednesday and ends Aug. 29. Flom, an underground diesel mechanic who unsuccessfully ran for a school board seat in 2020, will be sworn in Monday. His wife is a middle school teacher in the district.

Flom fills the seat vacated by the board's former chairwoman, Rachelle Morris, who resigned in July.

In a taped interview that was part of the appointment process, Flom said he believes the board's current members have strong experience but the board would benefit from "younger blood," like himself, who have children currently in Green River schools.

As a new board member, Flom said he'll prioritize listening to constituents and that he wants to "help out the school system that helped (him) out."

He expects the district's budget to get "tighter and tighter" in coming years, and he said the district needs to focus on ensuring Green River schools "actually still offer our kids as much as we can."

In his new position, Flom said he wants to ensure new programming is right for Green River, regardless of national trends.

Not every graduate will be ready to start earning a four-year college degree after high school, and the district needs to ensure it's adequately serving students who will work in trades not requiring a four-year degree, he said.

"Not everyone can go to a four-year college. I wouldn't have made it," he said. Teaching life skills and financial skills are also important, he said.

As a student at Green River High School, Flom said he benefitted from concurrent enrollment classes at Western Wyoming Community College, and he said the district should promote similar opportunities for students.

"I was able to walk in at Western as a sophomore and, in two years, walk out with two associate's degrees," he said. "I couldn't have done that if I didn't get some courses out of the way (in high school)."

Two other candidates applied for the vacant school board position: Joe Clingenpeel and Patricia Louderback.

Interviews with Clingenpeel and Louderback were conducted in a public session period to the start of the school board's regular Tuesday meeting. Flom was out of town Tuesday so Superintendent Craig Barringer conducted a taped interview with the candidate last week for the board's review.

Louderback is a recently-retired employee of Green River schools.

As a community resident for more than 40 years, Louderback described herself as an accessible public servant.

Clingenpeel is a former teacher at SCSD No. 2 but currently works as an administrator at SCSD No.1. Throughout his time working in public education, he said he's learned that board members need to have "thick skin." Given the shortage of bus drivers nationwide, Clingenpeel said the challenge of busing students would be an issue he'd want to address had he been appointed to the board.

Classes at Green River schools begin next week. As another school year starts, the district's curriculum director, Greg Figenser, said administrators are working on boosting the district's emphasis on social-emotional learning. The COVID-19 pandemic made that a more glaring issue that needs to be addressed, he said.

The district's work will be largely inspired by "The School Wellness Wheel," a book and administrative framework that works on combatting the consequences of childhood trauma in schools.