Richmond School Board meetings will look very different this year.

On Monday, the new board unanimously backed a slate of rules that will limit how long individual members can talk on each issue to three minutes, cap most presentations from Superintendent Jason Kamras’ administration at five minutes, prohibit last-minute agenda changes except in the case of emergencies and revamp the monthly meeting schedule. 

The changes are intended to rein in the board’s notoriously long meetings, which in prior years have frequently stretched to 10 p.m. and beyond. 

“To streamline meetings would be incredible for multiple constituencies, including our security people, who have repeatedly expressed how late they drive home at night … our staff members and our parents and constituents who are either here or tuning in,” said 5th District representative Stephanie Rizzi. “They will at this point maybe get to go to bed at a reasonable hour and not have to miss any important information.” 

While the board has been holding two regular meetings on the first and third Mondays of each month, beginning this February it will hold a work session on the first Monday of each month, followed by a regular meeting on Tuesday. That schedule will also reduce some overlap between meetings of the School Board and City Council, which frequently meets on Mondays.   

Several of the changes proposed by Kamras, such as the three-minute limit on member comments, have been put forward by board members in the past but failed to gain enough support to go into effect. 

Seventh District member Cheryl Burke, a vocal proponent of time limits, said Monday the new rules have “been a long time coming.” 

“If you can’t stay in three minutes, then so be it,” she said. 

Vice Chair Matthew Percival voiced one note of caution, saying that “if we were to limit ourselves and we were to get a very heavy subject matter during the meeting such that we could not get through the debate in three minutes, where would that leave us?” 

But because the rules are changes to protocols rather than division policies, Clerk Patrece Richardson said the board will continue to be able to adjust how it operates and is “definitely allowed to make modifications based off the situation.” 

Chair Shavonda Fernandez, the one member of the board to oppose a three-minute limit last year who is still serving, said that while it took her some time to come around to the change, she now supported it “with the caveat of if it’s a heavy discussion and something that we need to flesh out, that we have the ability to do so.” 

Presentations on Dreams4RPS, the division’s strategic plan, will be exempted from the five-minute limit because, said Kamras, those updates “are the core of our work and I think warrant further discussion.” 

Nearly all School Board meetings contain discussion of how the division is doing in meeting the different goals outlined in Dreams4RPS, which range from improvements in accreditation, test outcomes and graduation rates to better teacher retention, enrollment increases and attendance upticks. 

Shannon Heady of Richmonders for Effective Governance of Schools, a group that emerged last year to push for better governance practices on the board and was heavily involved in the November elections, praised the new rules as a step in the right direction. 

“I am absolutely ecstatic that they are taking seriously the mandate for better governance and better organizing their time and work,” she said.