Happily, the school (through the action planning committee) has developed a survey sent home to parents. Maybe not a perfect instrument, but something that is a start to getting some parent feedback about the school that can serve as one benchmark for school improvement over time. It would be nice to have something that is also completed by community members without kids in school, but it will be hard enough to get these surveys back that maybe we don’t have to go there yet (survey return rates can be as low as 2 or 3% so the results of such a survey need to be considered in light of response rates).
The other big news from the principal is the hiring process of Maggie Nowers, long time Office Czar at Westminster Schools. Undoubtedly, this transition can be a real challenge for the school. Maggie is irreplaceable in many ways and probably a huge amount of information is filed in her head. Hopefully, she can help with the transition. At the same time, this is an opportunity to look at how some things may be done differently (like ways to save paper and other resources through some use of technology or streamlined processes). Keep your fingers crossed.
The superintendent reported on the stimulus package (as much as is known so far). This is the kind of stuff that can drive fiscal conservatives a bit crazy. Not much is known, what is known is filtered through state officials who are not portrayed at the local level as the sharpest tacks in the box, and the direction of use seems to be to spend money on things that “improve education” but don’t have on-going expenses and doesn't just offset pre-budgeted expenses. While surely there are some expenditures that will have real educational benefits, nothing specific has been on the board radar for using these funds (although buying computers or books or class materials seems both stimulative for the economy and have long term benefits for kids). Hopefully the board will hear some of these plans from the school before too many decisions are made about spending these unexpected resources.
The big excitement at this meeting, at least by turnout, was the issue of “transitions.” In what passes as a public crowd, there were about 6 parents who showed up (although given the title, I am not sure how they could tell what exactly the focus was). What most of these parents wanted to talk about was complaining about their experience with the middle school they felt they had to have their child attend (although why they didn’t see any other option as viable was a puzzle to me) and then suggesting the idea of having a 7-8 program at Westminster (it should be noted one parent did defend the middle school with observations of the positive experience for her child). This then slid into a discussion about the costs and benefits of a 7-8 program at Westminster (that, of course, given the context, had little grounding in anything beyond opinion). I raised the point that if we are looking at questions about the current system of choice, this group was less than representative and that the history of what parents choose shows a pretty good number who seem to value having choices. No one who chose another option was at this meeting (as the agenda item was not stated as a question about eliminating choice). This is another one of those slippery areas for the board in considering if we are representing the whole of the community, parents of school kids as a whole, the best interests for education or kids as a whole, those who show up at a meeting, …???? I sense a tendency to overweight the very small number who show up at a meeting, although we do much too little to ensure diverse views might be aware of the issues at hand and encouraged to participate more visibly.
I don’t know if we got anywhere on the questions of transitions, except to hear that some people are not happy with the experience at the middle school, others are happy with this, and the conclusion that different kids have different reactions to any particular school experience. For me, this underlies my belief that more options are better than fewer since we can never really be all things to all people. Others seem to believe that having a “seat at the table” in a monolithic system (like someone on the school board) can address concerns and shortcomings. Unfortunately, my experience on the board and around schools makes me skeptical about how much influence a board can have, or even a principal, in changing teaching practices in a way that can best serve all kids.
The meeting ended on a more upbeat note with the principal evaluation where the superintendent rightly acknowledged the many strengths of Steve Tullar and his persistence in trying to improve learning at the school in the face of all sorts of elements in “the system” that make these kind of improvements much more difficult to achieve than most of us would want.
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