New Motions

I put out some draft motions on my last post. I appreciate the feedback and support I got through emails.  Below are the motions that I submitted yesterday to be put in the board book for our November 26 meeting. The first four are for the coming meeting and the last one is a notice of motion for our December 3 meeting. Here they are.


Motion 1 School to school transfers within SD57: 

• That the board receive information on transfers from schools (old to new school) per month from March to Sept 2013. 

Rational:

• To better understand enrollment trends in the school district. For example, this will provide background for understanding policy 5119, and will be useful data to add to what is collected during the strategic planning process.

Motion 2 Technology Planning:

• That district staff be directed to draft a new technology vision and policy in conjunction with our partner groups to reflect our immediate and future technology needs, including strategies for meeting the BC Education Plan goal of “learning empowered by technology”. 

Rationale:

• There has not been a District Technology plan since 2005 and there are many issues that could be addressed by a new plan. A new plan could be on its own or part of strategic planning.
• We live in a plugged in world and technology impacts students positively and negatively. A new plan is needed to address what has happened over the last decade and also connect with our policies about web safety and cyberbullying.
• There are gaps between tech savvy staff and students and those who are not, plus the gap between have and have-not students. A tech plan can address these issues with strategies.
• We need a balance between the business model for buying and supporting technology and the educational model for using technology for learning. A vision and tech plan made with partner groups can help define this balance.

Motion 3 Technology Planning:

• That the school district conduct an anonymous employee survey every three years to understand the technology needs in our school district to help set technology goals and identify challenges. The survey questions should be formed in collaboration with partner groups and the results of the survey made public. 

Rational:

• Openness in planning the survey questions and sharing the results will allow this evaluation to be free from bias and help increase transparency. This is important heading into Strategic Planning. There were concerns expressed that feedback on the Boardʼs Achievement Contract was not shared with the board. Being transparent about the nature of the survey from the start ensures that the results can be shared with the board and others. Obviously, district staff can remove any personal or libelous information prior to publication of results.

Motion 4 Flexibility for Mobile Technology 

• That the school district allow district schools to purchase media tablets and mobile technology of their choosing in accordance with their own technology planning process and the Acceptable Use of Networks Policy 

Rational:

• Tablets requested by teachers and administrators such as iPads and Chromebooks are not dependent on platforms (they work with PCs and Microsoft operating systems) and they were not part of the equation in the 2010 single platform decision. There is no actual policy prohibiting their purchase yet orders for these items are currently denied and schools with plans to move forward on technology have their hands tied.
• Many schools have encouraged “bring your own technology” for staff and students yet there is a recognized need to supply some technology for those who can not afford it and to provide pods of technology for special purposes such as the Learning Commons. Whether it is Surfaces, iPads, or whatever, schools need to know they have options.
• The apps and educational uses available on non-Surface tablets are in demand by teachers and students. Surfaces are currently more costly, have less educational apps available, and require more technical support than other available products. Tablets such as iPads and Chromebooks do not require software imaging and thus do not threaten network security in the same way as computers or Surfaces that require installation and monitoring by technicians.
• The point is that one size does not fit all, and what is cutting edge today may not be in five years, so flexibility is needed to support innovation and control costs. For the last three years, tablets have made an impact on the education world, three years from now it might be something different.
• The current technology standards and approval process may need to be updated, but this should not impede staff from innovating and Learning Empowered by Technology.

Motion 5 Student Informations Systems:

• That senior administration bring together a working group made to examine and assess AspenEsis and OpenStudent student information systems. The working group shall be made up of two (or more) of each: administrator, tech analyst, SASO or secretary doing student data entry, counsellor, and teacher. 

Rationale:

• Putting a student information system in place is a major decision in terms of cost, employee workload, and meeting goals. The choice and implementation of BCESIS had many issues that we wish to avoid this time round. 
• AspenEsis is the Ministry-recommended choice for districts to use for student information systems, and is managed by the same company that manages BCESIS. It has not been used in BC but has been in use in other jurisdictions. 
• OpenStudent is a made-in-BC student information system with a substantially lower cost than commercial products. It is the choice of four school districts so far, and is being considered by others. It is has been designed by staff in the Saanich School District and is being piloted in 22 schools. 
• These are the two realistic choices for school districts in BC. Both are designed to directly support 21st Century Learning as well as the Ministryʼs BC Education Plan. They are both following the same approximate testing and implementation cycle. A side-by-side comparison by a working group will give our district valuable information about which system, if any, meets our needs and budget. 
• The working group represents potential users of any new student information system and will be able to offer quick analysis about pros/cons of each system. The cost of the working group would be limited to replacement time for the teachers and CUPE members to attend one day of hands-on testing and discussion of the two systems. Assuming 4-6 employees who will require replacement, the cost will be approximately $1200-$1800. This is an example, the actual comparison can be flexible, main thing is that we actually look at how these systems work. 
• The work of the group will be considered as a key set of recommendations when it comes to deciding on a system for our district.

Draft motions

When I first ran for trustee I got a lot of input from my "campaign team." Basically these are all of the educators and parents that encouraged me to do it. This group includes my husband (a secondary teacher), friends and family who work for the school district, and parents and teachers that I met when we organized in 2010 to challenge the board to make changes to the Sustainability Report.

This group had a few things in common like a focus on transparency, accountability, strength of families and the need to rethink technology in our school district. I really valued their input and these became themes for me as a trustee. I have kept these values close by with almost every conversation and board discussion I have had. Our work as trustees always has the students in mind but along the way I think we have to pay more attention to how we get there and this means advocating for educators be that policy, funding, support, or technology.

Along these lines, I have a few motions to bring to the board in the next few weeks and I would love some feedback about the wording and also possible rationale. Some of these are a long time coming but I think the timing is right. I can update on a new post as I get more ideas and I will add my rationale. Please be honest this is just a draft at this point and you can leave a comment below or email me at trusteecooke@gmail.com.

Motion 1:
That the board receive information on transfers from schools (old to new school) per month from March to Sept 2013.

Motion 2:
That senior administration bring together a working group made to examine and assess AspenEsis and OpenStudent student information systems.

Motion 3:
That the school district conduct an anonymous employee survey every three years to understand the technology needs in our school district to help set technology goals and identify challenges.

Motion 4:
That district staff be directed to draft a new technology vision and policy in conjunction with our partner groups to reflect our immediate and future technology needs.

Motion 5:
That the school district allow district schools to purchase media tablets and mobile technology of their choosing in accordance with their own technology planning.

District Achievement Contract

Each year, School Boards in BC are responsible for approving a District Achievement Contract (DAC). According to the Ministry of Education (http://www.bced.gov.bc.ca/schools/sdinfo/acc_contracts/):

"Achievement Contracts are the Boards of Education's public commitment to improving student achievement. They are based on thoughtful consideration of student performance information at the classroom, school, district and provincial level. 

Achievement Contracts reflect the unique characteristics, priorities and needs of each district. The Contracts are part of an accountability cycle for schools, school districts, and for the Ministry of Education. 

Reports on Student Achievement, prepared by the Superintendent, reflect progress made on the Achievement Contract, and may include updates on other important responsibilities."

This year's SD#57 DAC was prepared by senior staff (assistant superintendent and others) and includes the Superintendent's Report on Achievement from earlier in the year. For the first time the DAC was shared with the school district employees and the public for input or review purposes. As a board member, I am still not sure whether the input was intended for us, for the DAC writers, or for future considerations. I guess I'll have to wait and find out with everybody else.

You can read the SD#57 DAC here: http://www.sd57.bc.ca/fileadmin/cao.sd57.bc.ca/SD57_DAC_July_2013.pdf

You can read my review, editing suggestions, questions, and comments on the DAC here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/yamwcnv1subq9mq/2013.06.23%20DAC%20review.pdf

Three areas are important to point out:

1. The DAC mentions an Assessment Management System (AMS) that is going to move from pilot to district-wide implementation. I have concerns that there has not been adequate partner group consultation about this. Where is the implementation plan, including the costs of training and support? Will this add data-base management to the list of duties already assigned to teaching staff? I also wonder whether the services provided by AMS will be made redundant with the new database that will replace BCeSIS next year.
2. Technology goals and projects are mentioned in a few places in the DAC. Many of the statements do not paint an accurate picture of the very real technology concerns that have been brought before the district and board and also myself as a trustee from the PGDTA and individual teachers and students. I believe that our Board, Senior Staff, and partner groups need a more thorough conversation about how we support technology before we can state in a DAC that we are making progress.
3. The DAC mentions Eight Essential learning strands.  In a slightly different form these were also brought forward as surplus spending proposals by Senior Staff during "Extended Committee of the Whole" budget discussions with partner groups. Most of the partner groups (PGDTA, CUPE, PEA, DPAC) made a strong case that these proposals were valuable but should not be priorities and made counterproposals for budget priorities. The board summary of ECOW confirmed this. So I'm left wondering why the eight proposals are essentials when other priorities were not. I'm also wondering, if the Board approves the DAC are we giving approval-in-principle to budget spending on these Essential Eight?

All three areas relate to things that are important to me: openness and transparency, communication and consultation between partner groups.

Budget Approval

I had thought about putting together a blog post about why I voted against our School District 57's 2013-14 budget but I think the PG Citizen did a pretty good job of summarizing my reasons.

http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/article/20130531/PRINCEGEORGE0101/305319991/-1/princegeorge/sd57-146-s-budget-vote-passed-by-narrow-margin

I agree with what Trustee Bourassa had to say:

"I don't believe that it did anything to address any of the input we received from partner groups," said Bourassa. "We went through extreme measures to gather input and had some really good ideas and suggestions and there was nothing in there to reflect that in that budget bylaw. In my opinion, we should have incorporated more of the input we had received into the budget. The two areas that were fulfilled -- the continuation of projects and leaving school-based budgets alone -- were fulfilled by doing nothing."

I was also not impressed that we couldn't at least do one thing to reflect the budget input we got from our partner groups. My motion at a previous board meeting because of a procedure problem related to faulty minutes from an in-camera meeting that we did not catch in time. My motion came up again but was not approved:

One of the requests of the expanded budget committee was to hire two occupational therapists and one speech pathologist for the 2013-14 school year using the current unappropriated surplus funding to avoid having to cut existing staff levels. That was presented as a motion at Tuesday's meeting, but was rejected.

This is the second year in a row we have had problems using the input from partner groups in our budget. Hopefully third time is the charm.

Report on Achievement

At our last board meeting January 15th, the superintendent delivered his annual Report on Achievement. This document is tied to our District Achievement Contract and requires trustee approval to be accepted as an official Ministry of Education submission on behalf of School District 57. The document has a deadline set at the end of January.

I made a motion to postpone approval of the Report until the Superintendent had a chance to make edits, and (after this failed 6:1), voted against accepting the Report. A couple of people have asked me why I did this so I thought I would write a bit about that.

First, the Report had lots of optimism, which is good, but also some items that deserved a second look. I took some time to review the report on achievement and put some comments, questions, typos, and friendly suggestions together on a version of the Superintendent's Report that you can read here. I think I ended up with 57 comments. Some of my comments are similar to last year's report like the need for more than 2-5 years of data in order to see a trend, and some of them are new. I picked a few of the comments to address at the board meeting, but was only able to bring up two in the time allowed. As I shared with the other trustees beforehand, my goal is that we see a high quality and highly accurate report.

I was a bit surprised that a majority of us would not see the value in postponing a decision on the report until the next meeting on January 29th. In my mind that was why we set up two board meetings in January to begin with. I am also a bit leary about accepting a report that may or may not be altered after the fact. I can guess that the typos at least will be fixed, but I won't find out until it after it goes to the Minister, so my approval would come before seeing the final document. On the one hand the Report goes in unchanged and is not the best report it should be. On the other hand a slightly different Report goes in than the one trustees voted on. That was why I voted no.

As with every decision I've made as a trustee, I need to know that my questions have been addressed before voting in favour of a proposal. I realize that Reports like this are mostly about Ministry requirements, but they also speak on behalf of the employees and partners of our school district and reflects the work they do.

This has happened to me a few times, where I seem to be voting no with some or all of the others voting yes because we each have different criteria for what gets our vote. One example was a bussing contract. For all I know it was the best contract ever but I did not get to see it or have it summarized, so I was not comfortable rubber stamping it without knowing what was in it. That's democracy I guess, and I don't mind being a trustee that holds out on principle. I can see why being positive all the time, accepting reports and proposals as they are leads to less grief as a trustee, but that is not why I became one. Each of us has an important role to play, some are good communicators, some are good at meetings and Robert's Rules, some are good at attending school functions and celebrating what's going on, and so on. I'd like to think my role is to ask lots of questions and keep coming back to transparency and openess, high quality work at the board office, and improved communications including the reports that speak for our district.