The Cheney School District has hired a former Blackhawk as its new finance director.
The district announced in a Feb. 8 news release it had selected Jamie Weingart as the next director of finance. Weingart replaces Kassidy Probert, who announced last month that he was accepting director of school financial services position with Northeast Washington Educational School District 101 (NEWESD 101) in Spokane.
Weingart is a 2003 Cheney High School graduate, where she did a number of activities including starring on the Lady Blackhawks volleyball and basketball squads as Jamie Runyon. She went on to Eastern Washington University where she received a bachelor of fine arts degree in business administration. She also holds certifications as a certified public accountant and as a chartered global management accountant.
Weingart has served as the director of fiscal/administration services for the past four years in the Freeman School District. Before that she worked as fiscal systems manager for NEWESD 101, serving as a business manager for multiple school districts and providing accounting and technical support across Eastern Washington.
“That experience in schools is going to be super beneficial for us,” Cheney Superintendent Rob Roettger said.
Roettger, who served on the interview committee that spoke with the four finalists for the position, said Weingart came across as “very thorough, very professional.” Roettger added that they had a “good pool of candidates” from which to choose from in the three-week process.
“Jamie just stood out above that,” Roettger said.
Weingart’s transition from Freeman to Cheney will be a slow one, Roettger said, as she will be spending most of her time at the Rockford-area district and one day a week in Cheney.
“She is the whole finance department (in Freeman),” Roettger said. “We want to support them as much as possible so they are not left in a lurch.”
Roettger said Probert, who has been with the district since 2013 and whose last official day was Feb. 9, will also be pitching in some time in Cheney, assisting with an upcoming audit the district will be undergoing.
Prior to Weingart’s coming to NEWESD 101, she worked as a senior accountant at DeCoria, Maichel & Teague performing audits and accounting for various public entities, including school districts. She is currently completing a master’s degree in school business leadership through Wilkes University.
Weingart’s mother Karen Runyon is a math teacher at Cheney High School and the current Cheney Education Association union president. Roettger said Runyon is set to retire at the end of the school year.
John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.
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