The many hats of Laci Johnson

Laci Johnson has a whole lot of mugs and a whole lot of shoes, which is fitting for someone who wears so many hats.

The human resources director for Burlington Community School District might be found in the boardroom consulting with Superintendent Robert Scott and her fellow cabinet members. She might be in her office tending to matters of employee relations or meeting with her HR team. She also might be found in a school building to meet with staff and admin.

No matter where the day’s duties take her, she strives to create a supportive and comfortable work environment.

“If you’re going to work with me or be around me for any length of time, you know that I like to joke around and I like to laugh and I really like to make sure that people are comfortable. That’s important to me,” Johnson said on a recent Friday inside her office on the third  floor of the Administration Building. “I love everybody here. I just want them to do a good job for our students and just do what we’re all here to do, which is to support that.”

From transportation to education

Johnson has been in her current position since January 2019, but she first came into education in 2008 as a substitute teacher after earning her degree in K-6 elementary education from Iowa Wesleyan College.

“During that year of subbing, I found it incredibly beneficial to sub in every area in every grade level,” Johnson said. “I found out that I did not want to teach elementary; I actually preferred high schoolers.”

So when she was offered a job as a special education teacher at Burlington High School, she was happy to accept.

She remained a special education teacher for six years, during which time she helped to put in place a transition class called Career and Self Exploration for students with Individualized Education Plans. She was also nominated by her students for The Hawk Eye’s Teacher of the Year award.

“You’re nominated by students, and that is everything, because that just shows that you’re building relationships with them,” Johnson said. “The Hawk Eye would send you the nomination forms and you got to see who it was and what they said about you, and that is worth a million dollars. … That just meant the world to me. It didn’t matter if I won the award. Just to be nominated was super exciting.”

Johnson stressed that she is but one of many BCSD teachers to have been nominated for the award.

Four years into her teaching career, Johnson enrolled in Drake University’s educational leadership program, from which she graduated in 2015.

She then accepted a position as an assistant principal at BHS. In that capacity, she was in charge of the special education program.

Drawing from her own experience teaching special ed, Johnson set about creating a comprehensive resource binder for special education teachers to assist them with things unique to their profession. That binder was adopted district-wide.

After about 4 ½ years as an assistant principal, another opportunity came knocking on Johnson’s door, and it was one that she was uniquely well suited to take on.

Before Johnson worked in schools, she worked for Nelson Trucking, a family trucking business in Mediapolis that had been started by her grandfather and his brother.

“I learned a lot about the trucking industry,” Johnson said, ticking off a long list of responsibilities that included payroll, dispatch and keeping up on qualification files for drivers. “So having a little bit of that background in HR and having that lens of teacher, principal and HR, it seemed like a really good fit to jump at the opportunity.”

Still, her decision to leave the high school was a tough one.

“(Special education) is a love of mine and I knew immediately that I was going to miss working with those teachers and working with those students, and the AEA team was fabulous and I knew it was going to be a hard transition,” Johnson said. “But something was pulling me over to HR.”

Life in the HR lane

The world of human resources is a diverse one.

“I feel like sometimes when you tell people you’re in HR, there’s a lot of people I talk to, not just in the district but in general in life, they immediately think hire and fire, and that is not really everything that it is,” Johnson said. “There’s many different hats you wear in HR.”

BCSD has more than 600 employees. That involves a whole lot of hiring, certification oversight, contract issuances, employment letters, training, negotiations, unemployment claims, benefits, worker’s compensation, evaluations, background checks, and policies to keep track of.

“Wanda (Hind) and Julia (Dichraff) are incredible,” Johnson said of the HR secretary and assistant. “I definitely could not get through this without them. Through the tasks, through the conversations, they are just there for me and I appreciate them so much.”

The COVID-19 pandemic brought additional responsibilities.

“COVID and HR was unbelievable and stressful and there were so many things that we did and had to attend to, whether it was health and hygiene plans that we had to create for all of the buildings, all of the different forms, accommodations needed to be made,” Johnson said. “That was a really weird and scary time, but I’ll tell you what, in this district, it doesn’t matter what is in front of you, we will get it done, and we did.

“And we can look back and kind of chuckle about it now, but you put your head down and you do your work, and that’s how everybody operates in this district, and that’s why I’m so proud to be a part of it.”

Recruitment and retention are another area of focus for Johnson, whose recruitment efforts include an annual job fair event held at the Administration Building and casting a wide net for potential candidates by traveling further and further to represent BCSD in job fairs for educators.

“Part of my job is to attend a lot of the job fairs. We’ve really ramped that up in the last couple of years,” Johnson said.

It is through those efforts, word-of-mouth by those in the district, and the district’s participation in the Teacher Paraprofessional Registered Apprenticeship program that BCSD largely has been able to get out from under the teacher shortage that was exacerbated by the pandemic.

“Two years ago, we had 18 long-term subs, and that is a very high number,” Johnson said, noting that nearly all of them were either in a teacher prep program or were associates with experience in the education system already.

Last year was slightly better but still difficult, with 14 long-term subs. This year, there are only four, with seven teaching positions having been filled by TPRA graduates.

But Johnson said the spirit of the district is what really helps attract and retain employees.

“This is a credit to everybody who works in the district,” Johnson said. “Everyone is trying to help attract people to become Grayhounds, and I really love that.”

As for Johnson, she can’t see herself being anywhere else.

“I remember when I first got my job here and someone said to me, ‘You work at Burlington High School? Isn’t that scary?’ And I remember laughing and thinking, ‘if you would just walk in these doors with me for one day you would find and see what I see, which is students who are so fun, teachers who are so fun and work so hard, administrators who will support you however you need, and I hope that’s what others experience in their buildings. …

“Why not Burlington? If anybody came here, they would see and know how great it is.”

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