{"id":16024,"date":"2025-10-22T11:47:55","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T17:47:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-school-board-swears-in-student-board-members-discusses-mill-levy-and-safety\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:53:27","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T03:53:27","slug":"mancos-school-board-swears-in-student-board-members-discusses-mill-levy-and-safety","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mancos-school-board-swears-in-student-board-members-discusses-mill-levy-and-safety\/","title":{"rendered":"Mancos school board swears in student board members, discusses mill levy and safety"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The 2025-26 student board members, Rhett Brown (left) and Greta Thompson (middle), were sworn in by Superintendent Audrey Hazleton at the board\u2019s Monday board meeting. (Audrey Hazleton\/Courtesy photo)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

At its Monday night meeting, the Mancos RE-6 school board swore in two student members for the 2025\u201326 school year, reviewed the upcoming mill levy election and discussed safety and the strategic plan.<\/p>\n

The board heard from member Rachel McWhirter, Superintendent Audrey Hazleton and high school social studies teacher William Custer about the students selected to serve.<\/p>\n

The two students, chosen through an application and interview process, were introduced as Mancos High School senior Greta Thompson and sophomore Rhett Brown.<\/p>\n

Thompson told the board she had been excited when she heard the board was adding student seats last year and was thrilled to be selected this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in such a safe community and that the board wants to hear from us as well \u2026 what you have is really just making sure that every student feels heard,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n

Brown shared an idea with the board.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne idea I had is definitely helping students be able to pitch their ideas to the board and help them communicate with the board better,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

Hazleton swore in Thompson and Brown after introductions.<\/p>\n

\"The
The Mancos school board poses for a photo with its new student board members. Back row, left to right: Tim Hunter and Rhett Brown. Front: Victor Figueroa, Rachel McWhirter, Greta Thompson, Emily Hutcheson-Brown and Craig Benally. (Audrey Hazleton\/Courtesy photo)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

During citizen comments, Mancos Elementary School second grade teacher Shanti Savage voiced support for the upcoming mill levy election, noting concerns from teachers and community members.<\/p>\n

Staff worried that only newly hired teachers would benefit from the override, while current teachers would face higher taxes without a pay increase.<\/p>\n

Savage said all teachers would receive a raise and added that a committee \u2013 made up of staff, parents and community members \u2013 would be formed if the override passes.<\/p>\n

Community members also expressed concern about the override, saying \u201cwe already pay too many taxes to the school.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn Mancos, we actually pay the smallest percentage of our operating budget out of any of the surrounding districts from local taxes,\u201d Savage said.<\/p>\n

DAC member Tigo Cruz also spoke in support, saying it was difficult to attract and retain quality teachers because of low pay.<\/p>\n

In her superintendent report, Hazleton outlined three goals: cultivating a healthy community, ensuring engaging learning and building cohesive, sustainable systems.<\/p>\n

As an example, Hazleton said students recently held their annual Crunch Off \u2013 which included a walking field trip to Fenceline Cider.<\/p>\n

\u201cChildren crunched on local apples, practiced fine motor skills while peeling, coring and spiralizing and sampled locally pressed cider,\u201d Hazleton said.<\/p>\n

Hazleton also mentioned the High School Student Alliance, the upcoming Healthy Kids Survey and the music program and fifth-grade class\u2019s Nov. 5 event, \u201cTo Honor and Remember.\u201d She described it as a hybrid celebration of D\u00eda de los Muertos and Veterans Day.<\/p>\n

She addressed safety, noting that on Oct. 10, the District Safety and Security Team reviewed a recent evacuation event \u2013 considered successful.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever, this was a stressful event that taxed district staff, students and parents in a variety of ways,\u201d Hazleton said. \u201cThe team has identified the five improvement areas and action planning is underway.\u201d<\/p>\n

The five areas were communication, preparedness, role clarity, reunification, individual student needs and technology\/communication devices.<\/p>\n

The goal is to finalize improvement plans, assign leaders and set a timeline by the end of November.<\/p>\n

The district will also reconvene its Student Resource Officer committee while the town of Mancos searches for a new marshal.<\/p>\n

Hazleton presented a strategic plan report. The new plan mirrors the Portrait of a Graduate competencies: integrity, teamwork, growth mindset, practical skills, problem solving and civic mindedness.<\/p>\n

The next Mancos school board meeting will be held at 6 p.m. Monday, Nov. 10.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

the board\u2019s second year having student members<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16025,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[155,28,83,392,60,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-16024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-education","tag-headlines","tag-mancos","tag-mancos-school-district-re-6","tag-montezuma-county","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16024"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19973,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16024\/revisions\/19973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16025"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16024"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=16024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}