Two days after Sweetwater County School District No. 1 Superintendent Joseph Libby was placed on paid administrative leave and the assistant superintendent position was eliminated, questions surrounding those decisions remain largely unanswered.
School board chair Cole Wright said in an emailed statement Wednesday the board wants to be clear about the delay of communication.
“While there is never an easy time to implement change, circumstances throughout the District required immediate attention to keep our focus on our students first and to maintain the continuity of District operations,” Wright wrote to Cowboy State Daily.
Rock Springs Mayor Max Mickelson, who served two full terms and two years of a third term on the school district's Board of Trustees before leaving the board to serve as mayor, told Cowboy State Daily in a Wednesday email that members are sometimes required to make consequential decisions while being legally or ethically limited in what they can say publicly.
“That can create a frustrating gap between what the community understandably wants to know and what responsible governance permits a board to disclose,” Mickelson said.
The Board of Trustees voted unanimously Monday to place Libby on leave after a lengthy executive session that took up most of the scheduled board meeting. The board also voted unanimously to eliminate the assistant superintendent position held by Nicole Bolton.
As of Wednesday, the district had not appointed an interim superintendent. No one answered calls to the Superintendent’s Office and no one returned Cowboy State Daily’s message before publication.
Questions Remain
Wright said in his Wednesday email the board understood the decisions had generated questions among staff, families, community members and the media, but said there were limits to what the district could disclose.
He said the board must balance its commitment to communicating with the community with its legal and ethical obligations regarding employee confidentiality.
“These decisions were made after careful consideration of the District’s current needs and its responsibility to provide stable, effective leadership,” Wright said in a statement released Tuesday.
Wright did not answer Cowboy State Daily’s question about whether Libby’s leadership had been stable or effective.
“The Board will provide additional information regarding the District’s organizational goals and objectives when available,” the Tuesday statement said.
The district also has not indicated what will happen next with Libby, saying it will not speculate about future personnel actions or discuss confidential personnel matters.
Administrative leave, Wright said, “is not, by itself, a disciplinary determination.”
Questions Remain
The Wyoming Department of Education Superintendent Megan Degenfelder said in an emailed statement late Wednesday that decisions regarding school district personnel are their own.
"From the beginning, my efforts in Sweetwater County School District No. 1 have been for the students and parents that came forward asking for help," Degenfelder said. "I hope this marks an opportunity to turn the page and focus on rebuilding trust with families and improving student well-being and performance."
A WDE internal investigation of the district earlier this year found major failures in its special-education practices.
The WDE report described a culture of mistrust between staff and district administration.
The district objected to the findings and filed a petition in district court calling for a review of the decision. Libby told Cowboy State Daily in a March email the district formally communicated its concerns to state officials to ensure the monitoring process adhered to basic standards of consistency, communication and fairness.
The district also submitted a formal public records request seeking “any additional complaints, reports, or findings that reference or involve Sweetwater County School District No. 1,” Libby said in the same email.
The district initially named as respondents both the Department of Education and a parent, Rachel Seppie, who filed the underlying complaint. Seppie was later dismissed as a respondent via a stipulation by the court.
Seppie is the wife of former Sweetwater County School Board member Cole Seppie, who resigned from the board last year. He was publicly censured after visits with district teachers, janitors, lunchroom staff and principals in what he described as fact-finding missions.
I always asked the same three questions,” Seppie told Cowboy State Daily in February.
“I asked them: 'What can the board do to make you more successful in your job? Are you getting the support you need from your building administration and central office? And is there anything else you’d like to share — positive or negative?'”
Seppie told Cowboy State Daily in an emailed statement Wednesday he was encouraged by the school board’s initial steps to address the district’s leadership concerns and provide much needed accountability.
“For too long, the community, staff and students have lacked adequate support from this administration,” Seppie said. “More work remains: the school board must fully address concerns at the top and demonstrate a clear commitment to putting staff and students first.”
Mickelson said there can be circumstances in which public officials are unable to explain the reasoning behind a decision, even when community members have legitimate questions.
His connection to the district remains personal: His wife is a principal in the district, and two of his children attend its schools.
“I do not view what is happening in our schools from a distance,” he said. “This is my family’s school district, too.”
Staff Questions
Another sticky point at recent meetings has been the board’s public comment policy.
Listed as an agenda item for Monday’s meeting was suspending the district’s public-comments policy for another month while the school board continued to revise it.
At Monday’s meeting, the board did not take oral comments, but a written comment from the district’s Special Programs Coordinator Tina Johnson asked why previous questions she directed to the superintendent or board had not been answered.
Johnson also asked about the district’s life insurance and why she had not received an administrator or teacher pay increase.
“Please answer in writing my previous questions,” Johnson wrote.
Johnson did not return Cowboy State Daily’s call prior to publication.
The questions come as the district works through the leadership transition and attempts to maintain regular operations.
Wright said the board is working with district leadership to ensure essential responsibilities are covered and employees receive the support they need.
Another Board Departure
The district is also facing turnover among its elected leadership.
Matt Gardner, who represented the Farson/Eden area, announced his resignation at Monday’s meeting. In a Sept. 11 letter, Gardner said changes in his personal and professional commitments meant he could no longer devote the time and dedication the position deserved.
His resignation is the fourth departure from the school board in less than a year, following Seppie’s late 2025 resignation and the resignations of Anjelica Wood and Chad Franks in June.
Cowboy State Daily reached out to all three former board members for comment about the latest changes. Gardner and Franks did not return calls before publication, and Wood declined comment.
The district is accepting letters of interest from Farson/Eden-area residents who want to fill the remainder of Gardner’s term. Letters must be received by 3 p.m. Oct. 1 at the superintendent’s office.
Bolton Awaits Reassignment
The district’s decision to eliminate the assistant superintendent position also does not mean Bolton is leaving the district.
According to the district, Bolton remains an employee and is awaiting reassignment.
The assistant superintendent position was eliminated as part of what the district described as “an organizational restructuring and realignment of District priorities and resources.”
The duties associated with the position will be assigned internally under the direction of the board, according to the district, in an effort to maintain continuity of operations and leadership.
The district has declined to discuss Bolton’s compensation or the details surrounding the decision.
“Because these matters involve District personnel, the District will not publicly discuss confidential employment information, including individual compensation or the details underlying personnel decisions,” Wright said.
Keep Asking Questions
Despite the lack of specifics, Wright said Wednesday the statement “does not mean that our community should stop asking questions.
“Our goal is to communicate as clearly and openly as we can,” Wright said. “But we would also encourage our community not to assume that every unanswered question reflects a lack of transparency or the idea that someone is not being listened to.
“The Board recognizes that periods of leadership change create uncertainty and speculation. However, the Board respectfully asks that we don’t allow this period of time to take away from the tremendous amount of ordinary acts of care and proficiency displayed in our schools every day.”
That message was similar to the words Mickelson shared with Cowboy State Daily hours earlier:
“Periods of leadership change naturally create uncertainty, and parents are entitled to ask questions,” he said. “But I hope we do not allow that uncertainty to obscure the thousands of ordinary acts of competence and care happening in our schools every day.”
For Mickelson, that means continuing to ask questions while remembering the students and employees at the center of the district.
“For parents who are worried right now, that would be my message: keep asking reasonable questions, stay engaged, and also remember that your children are surrounded every day by an extraordinary number of people who care deeply about them and about the success of our schools,” he said.
“I hope we keep our attention on the people who matter most: our students.”
Kate Meadows can be reached at kate@cowboystatedaily.com.
