Lexington-Richland 5 announces special meeting on replacing superintendent. Here’s when

Lexington-Richland 5 is holding a special school board meeting next Tuesday to name an interim superintendent.

It will be the first time board members will meet to discuss the superintendent’s job since Superintendent Christina Melton’s surprise resignation on Monday, but the public may not hear much of that discussion.

After convening at 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, the board will go into a closed-door executive session to discuss naming a short-term replacement for Melton, who is leaving the district’s top job June 30.

The board will reconvene in public for any action on the superintendent’s job. The board has said it plans to have a replacement in place by July 1.

The meeting will be held at the school district office, 1020 Dutch Fork Rd., Irmo.

The special meeting was announced Thursday after Melton’s surprise announcement that she would be stepping down from her job leading the Chapin-Irmo school district, only a month after she was named S.C. superintendent of the year.

Since then, both Melton and the school board have kept quiet about her reasons for leaving. Former board member Ed White, who resigned his seat in the wake of an agreement between the board and Melton over her resignation, has publicly accused board members Nikki Gardner, Catherine Huddle and Ken Loveless of essentially bullying Melton into leaving the job by creating a “hostile and abusive work environment.”

A settlement agreement between the two parties obtained by The State details Melton’s exit in exchange for a $226,368 payout. The agreement was agreed behind closed doors and never publicly voted on by the board, raising questions on its legality.

This story was originally published June 17, 2021 at 12:16 PM.

Bristow Marchant

The State

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Bristow Marchant covers local government, schools and community in Lexington County for The State. He graduated from the College of Charleston in 2007. He has almost 20 years of experience covering South Carolina at the Clinton Chronicle, Sumter Item and Rock Hill Herald. He joined The State in 2016. Bristow has won numerous awards, most recently the S.C. Press Association’s 2024 education reporting award.  Support my work with a digital subscription