The Earth Moved

The July 23rd BOE meeting marks the beginning of what I hope will be a new era of change and progress for the ECASD with Dr. James Leary in the position of Interim Superintendent. He was animated, gracious, optimistic, energetic and a huge change for the leadership of the ECASD. His opening remarks included that "it is a pleasure to be here" and that he is "looking forward to a good year, a fun year and a productive year." A real breath of fresh air. He said that he is very busy identifying issues to work on as ell as being out in the community meeting with as many people as he can.

We are still operating under the trial period of having all Public Input at the beginning of the session which continues to be an exercise in futility and lack of meaningful community participation but that clearly seems to be the intention when Pres. O'Brien proposed the change. Bev Christianson who is with the clerical union commented that in the presentation last week by Mr. Kling there was part of the cuts that had already been made by the GSA Committee that were missed in the totals presented.

I reprised my role as St. John the Baptist crying out in the wilderness the same message over and over again: "Why is there never any information made available to the community prior to the BOE meetings about agenda items so our comments to the board can be intelligent and based on the data that the board is being given?" Again, as has been the case for every single BOE meeting for months, there was not even a single copy available so that the public could huddle around or pass it up and down rows so attendees could follow the discussion or take any notes.

Why is this acceptable??? Yes, I understand that we all are sentimental and value tradition. But the tradition in the ECASD has been that only a few people in Administration or on the BOE have any information and they make all of the decisions. So I think maybe, collectively, we can ask to change the tradition and hope that with the presence of Dr. Leary we can create a new paradigm of transparency. I will post e-mails that were sent by myself and Laura Jensen to the BOE following the 7-23-07 board meeting asking for something different. Maybe a few of you out there could also e-mail the BOE and Dr. Leary with similar messages and it might actually happen.

Comm. Craig asked how the BOE members should respond to the public comments. Comm. Kneer felt that this was not a debate time and the Board could respond at future Board Meetings. Comm. Cummins reiterated that the Board Docs technology (http://www.boarddocs.com/) would be an excellent way to share information with the public. Pres. O'Brien seemed genuinely surprised and said he was unfamiliar with it even though this is the fourth time Comm. Cummins has proposed this solution. Cummins indicated that she would like it to be a future BOE Agenda item.

Dr. Leary then presented his proposal to implement a School Improvement Plan that would serve as a model to set objectives and activities to achieve those objectives for making progress and evaluating and reporting progress in the ECASD. Please see the separate posting labelled School Improvement Plan for the details. My only comments are that it was an amazing ray of hope for the future of our district to be able to see that the ECASD might actually become an organization that is run professionally, strategically, with a philosophy and goals to support the plan. Dr. Leary indicated that the Facilites plan from Charlie Kramer was exemplary. I have seen the Facilities Plan and I completely agree that it is comprehensive and forward thinking. My only 2 thoughts about it are these:
1. It is a stand alone document and does not support any broader strategic goals for our district than to basically maintain the current configuration of buildings that exist now. It is not a response to the overriding strategic question: "What should K-12 public education be in Eau Claire? What are our programming priorities for the ECASD? How and where should educational services be delivered to students?"
2. Where was the public input to the plan? Who participated in deciding what buildings should be improved or torn down and why? It does not answer the question how many elementary or middle schools does EC want or need or can afford to staff? It is not a response to a dialog that the district and community has had about what Charter Schools do we want and where should they be located? etc, etc, ...

Comm. Cummins asked Dr. Leary what should the BOE be doing in the School Improvement process. He said that after thorough discussion and revisions he would hope that the BOE would UNANIMOUSLY adopt such a process for the ECASD. Again, I would hope the community would be part of this discussion and process. Please go to the separate post on this blog to see the details!! It is the future for our district.

As if that were not enough energy and innovation for audience members who were clearly amazed by some true leadership and new ideas, Dr. Leary then shared another document called the Needs Assessment Survey that he is asking BOE members to review and indicate their top priorities for focus for the next 1 to 3 years. Ladies and gentleman, this was, I am not kidding, a list of 112 possibilities of things that our district could actually decide to accomplish! It was groundbreaking. It was broad and far reaching. It was ambitious. It was a list of so many opportunities that have been missed for so many years that you could cry but instead it made you want to jump up and down with happiness that the ECASD is moving in the right direction. Again, please go to the separate post labeled Needs Assessment for all the wonderful details.

Dr. Leary indicated that BOE members should circle the ones they believe are priorities and make additional comments, answers will be kept anonymous, and he will use that input to make a list of priorities. Comm. Faanes asked about adding new ones and Dr. Leary said that is welcome as well.

The final major Agenda item for the evening concerned the precarious state that the ECASD Student Information System (SIS) and Storage Area Network (SAN) are in and the process to replace those systems. IT employees indicated that there have been "significant" issues recently and that, basically, these systems are so outdated and overwhelmed that they are running on a hope and a prayer. I quote: "It is beyond acceptable to run the district on luck" which apparently has been the case with some serious system crashes that did not occur in the middle of a school day. The SIS is farther along with replacement in that an RFP has gone out and come back and they are down to 2 finalists they will bring back for a lab situation before the final decision is made. The RFP for the SAN will go out still in July. The SAN must be in place before the SIS implementation. Staff development for the new SIS would be next summer.

This discussion spawned a lengthy tangent about where these systems are located (in the lower level of the Main Office building) and Comm. Craig indicated that it is the oldest building in the district and maybe a facilities study about relocating the NOC (Network Operating Center) should also be evaluated. The IT personnel indicated that moving the NOC would be a significant expense. Comm. Wogahn, clearly peeved, said that he has heard so many community comments about this building and the perception that it is too big and that it is filled with "administrators hanging out the windows". He indicated that the board should obtain estimates for relocating the NOC and costs to set up a new facility and demolish the old one because nobody wants to buy it. He threw in the comment that the community thinks the solution is just to move a few desks and fire all the administrators "when we already have done that."

Wow! So who got fired? Holly Hart? Don Johnson? Gregg Butler? Other BOE members just sat very still and allowed that comment to stop ringing in everybody's ears.

Comm. Cummins indicated that faulty community perceptions are due to a "failure of leadership" to communicate with the public and be proactive. She also said that in the year and a half that she has been on the board that the BOE has not had this "crucial conversation" while other conversations have occurred that clearly do not have the priority that the dire state of district computing and network systems are in. All BOE members and Dr. Leary were very complimentary about the presentation and Comm. Kneer suggested that taking a tour of the NOC would be enlightening.

Legislative update from Pres. O'Brien was basically that the budget battle is raging in Madison with no end in sight.

Then there was an update about the City/County Community Visioning process that is being guided by the Civic League. Apparently, Patti Iverson, the Superintendent's secretary (?!?!), is the ECASD representative in this process. What the _____??
I am hoping/assuming that this is not the case for the entire process and maybe the BOE member or Administrator who are the real ECASD representatives were on vacation last week and Patti filled in. Pretty wierd that there was no other person available other than the secretary?

That's it for another exciting episode in "As the ECASD Turns".