Prairie View board votes to sign separation agreement with superintendent
- Roger Sims
- 5 hours ago
- 2 min read
By Roger Sims, Journal staff
LA CYGNE – The Prairie View USD 362 Board of Education voted unanimously to sign a separation agreement with Superintendent Chris Johnson during a special meeting on Monday, June 1. The details of the agreement were not immediately available.
The board emerged from more than an hour in closed door sessions, most of which to receive legal advice via conference call with an attorney. The board then went into another consecutive executive session to discuss personnel.
Following the vote on signing the separation agreement, the board unanimously voted to make assistant superintendent Joseph Hornback the acting superintendent until further action of the board.
No specific reason was given for the decision to not renew her contract, and board president Russell Pope declined to comment because it was a personnel issue. Nor would Pope comment on any cost of buying out the remainder of Johnson’s contract.
Johnson did not attend the meeting.
The board also met behind closed doors for more than 60 minutes of consecutive executive sessions during the regular board meeting on Thursday, May 28. At some point during those sessions, Johnson, who had been seated at her usual post with the board during the early part of the meeting, left the meeting room and was not there when the open session resumed.
At the board’s December 2025 meeting, one of the items on the agenda was renewal of contracts for administrators, including principals, superintendent and assistant superintendent.
After again meeting in executive session, the board emerged to extend all contracts except Johnson’s. While she still had a contract that extended through June 2027, the failure to extend was a blow.
Extension of administrative contracts for two years in advance is a standard practice for top level administrators, including superintendents and principals. The reason is it gives them job security for two school years into the future.
At the board’s April meeting, Johnson told the board that it would be time for her annual evaluation at the May meeting. That item was not on May’s regular meeting agenda, however.
After Thursday night’s meeting, Johnson has not returned to the district office according to staff.
Both Hornback and Johnson were finalists for the superintendent’s post following the resignation of Rex Bollinger in 2023. Johnson came to Prairie View from being the superintendent of the Crane, Mo., school district, and shortly after she was hired on a split vote, the board created the assistant superintendent post and hired Hornback, who had been the principal for Prairie View High School.
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