Randy Smith named 2017 OSBA president-elect
COLUMBUS – The Ohio School Boards Association Delegate Assembly has elected Randy Smith as the association’s 2017 president-elect. Smith serves on the Forest Hills Local Board of Education in Hamilton County.
He was elected during the Annual Business Meeting of the OSBA Delegate Assembly. The delegates meet each year at the Capital Conference, the association’s state convention that draws more than 9,000 school board members, administrators and other education leaders to Columbus.
Current OSBA President-elect Denise Baba, a member of the Streetsboro City Board of Education in Portage County, will become OSBA president on Jan. 1, 2017.
Smith will take over as OSBA president in 2018, following his term as president-elect. The president-elect’s duties include serving on OSBA’s Board of Trustees and Executive Committee, and chairing the Legislative Platform Committee and Federal Relations Network.
Smith has been a member of the Forest Hills Local Board of Education for 12 years. He currently serves on the OSBA Legislative Platform Committee and Federal Relations Network and previously on the Board of Trustees and Executive Committee. He has been a member of OSBA’s Southwest Region Executive Committee for nine years and was region president in 2012.
Smith earned the OSBA Master Board Member Award in 2007, a lifetime distinction, and has received multiple OSBA Awards of Achievement. The awards recognize board members’ commitment to learning and leadership.
The Cincinnati resident and graduate of Forest Hills Local’s Anderson High School helped establish several board of education committees at Forest Hills related to policy, technology and business. He also founded the Forest Hills Foundation for Education, a private organization that supports public education in the district. In addition, he serves as his district’s legislative liaison to OSBA.
Before retiring in 2015, Smith spent 36 years at the Procter & Gamble Co. where he was a marketing and policy manager. He currently is president and general manager of Noble Properties Inc.
At the University of Cincinnati, he earned a Bachelor of Science in industrial engineering and a Bachelor of Business Administration in marketing and management. His graduate studies included broadcasting and communication.
Smith remains very active with his alma mater where he serves on several boards and committees, including the University of Cincinnati Foundation Board of Trustees. He also is a district chair for the Boy Scouts of America.
He and his wife, Susan, who also is retired from Procter & Gamble Co., are the parents of a son, Steven, and a daughter, Sarah.
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• The Ohio School Boards Association’s Delegate Assembly also approved a number of amendments and added a plank to the association’s legislative platform. The platform conveys to legislators, policymakers, the public and the media where OSBA stands on issues impacting public education.
The Delegate Assembly is made up of representatives of public school districts from around the state. Delegates held their annual meeting today during OSBA’s 61st annual Capital Conference and Trade Show. More than 9,000 school board members, administrators and other education leaders regularly attend the annual conference at the Greater Columbus Convention Center. The conference runs through Nov. 16.
Delegates added a new plank to the school governance section of the platform that addresses shortcomings in the operation of academic distress commissions. The new plank supports legislation that:
• Fully includes locally elected boards of education and district administration in the decision- making process.
• Calls for the composition of the commission and review team to reflect the demographics (geographic, economic and social) of the school district.
• Provides transparency in the way distress commissions are formed and chaired.
• Provides a transparent understanding of the goals and purpose for the work of the distress commissions.
• Provides clear accountability measures for the commissions, the districts and CEOs appointed to the district in collaboration with the locally elected board of education.
• Places a focus on student achievement.
• Provides supplemental or additional funding for implementation of commission work.
• Places an emphasis on identifying and seeking the input of community services agencies.
The new academic distress commission plank opposes legislation that:
• Allows for the exclusion of the locally elected board members from the discussion and work of the commission.
In other action, delegates approved amendments supporting legislation that:
• Repeals state law, Ohio Revised Code 3313.534, so that the discipline of students can be
dealt with individually in a way that is appropriate to their age, gender, mental health condition, emotional development and special educational needs while appropriately protecting the school’s educational environment.
• Provides for no appointed board members to the State Board of Education.
• Directs any and all funds returned to the state by charter schools to traditional public schools of residence
Delegates approved amendments opposing legislation that:
• Prevents the advancement of a student to the next grade level and graduation based solely on state assessment results.
• Would adopt the similar student measure.
• Does not include all students in the baseline beginning in kindergarten and continuing through grade three.