Effective School Board Meetings

The most telling moment of the Lowell Joint School Board meeting on September 13^th was when the teachers walked out, leaving about 15 people in the room. Considering that five of those remaining were candidates for the school board in the next election that meant that turnout from parents and the general public was almost nonexistent.

We can only benefit from the increased involvement of parents and members of the public, so what can we do to help improve turnout? Here are a few suggestions:

• Clearly state the date, time and location of the board meetings on the district website.
• Utilize the district’s auto call system to contact all parents the day before a board meeting with the meeting details.
• Ensure that all materials presented during the meetings are concise and available for view prior to the meeting.
• Consider holding special meetings dedicated to complex or controversial topics to allow more time to review the information.
• Invest in microphones. It’s difficult to hear the board members’ comments.
• Allow more interaction between the board and the public during meetings.
• Increase the amount of time for public comment from three to five minutes. (If there are limited comments, allow even more time)
• Provide meeting notes on the district website within 48 hours of the conclusion of the meeting.

The only way to address the current challenges facing the district is to foster an open environment for the honest exchange of ideas.

If elected, I will work to make the school board meetings a place where all are welcome to come and share their point of view.

September's School Board Meeting

The plan this week was to continue on the topic of teacher evaluations but I was sidetracked first by a business trip out of town and then the school board meeting on Monday night. There were some interesting developments at the meeting so we’ll have to pick up where we left off on the subject of “Grading the Teachers” at a later time.

If I have learned anything over the past few months it is that the Lowell Joint School Board meetings are the equivalent of “Must See TV” and Monday’s meeting was no exception. The first clue that something was coming was when the meeting was moved from the district office to Meadow Green. I assume this was to accommodate the large number of people that have tried to attend meetings in the district’s small conference room recently.

(On a side note, I have to say that the Meadow Green campus is beautiful! The auditorium is roomy and well kept up and they have a stage! There was even green grass that was actually being watered! As a Jordan parent I can’t tell you the last time I drove by the school and saw it being watered. Our grass is a perpetual state of brown. But I digress……)

You know that you are in store for something interesting when the first thing you see upon arriving at the school is a picket line of teachers on the sidewalk, dressed in black. The meeting itself contained a lot of very useful information including a summary of the 2009/2010 district accomplishments, a budget review, the 2010 API results among other items on the agenda. You can view the details on the district’s website by clicking here.

There was a little more give and take between members of the audience and the board tonight. Usually there is no interaction and the members of the audience have to wait until the public comments time in the agenda to speak out. It was actually nice to see some discussion for a change (even though is was difficult to hear the board members as there was only one microphone).

As usual the fireworks really start when we get to the public comments. It was nice to hear a Macy parent provide some positive feedback to the board for addressing an issue around class size, but that was it for the positive notes.

The next few speakers lashed out at the board for a number of reasons with the final speaker of the night providing a update on the recent negotiations with the teachers that was punctuated by a mass walk-out of all the teachers that were present at the meeting.

I would like to say that there was an improvement in the tone of the meeting compared the recent meetings I attended in June, but there hasn't been much progress on that front. There is still an air of distrust between the board and the teachers that is as one of of the board members noted "the elephant in the room".

There were only about 15 people remaining after the teachers left (with five of those being candidates for the board in the upcoming election). With all that is going on in the district I would like to think that we would have a better turnout from the parents.....maybe they didn't know about the meeting?

There were a few more observations that I would like to make but this post is getting long so they will have to wait until next time.