Low Levels of Transparency Detected!

On June 26, 2007 a Work Session was held with 3 firms who had expressed interest in participating in the Comprehensive Community Planning Process (CCPP) with the ECASD. This meeting had been classified as a CLOSED session with the totally lame-o reason given that they were "negotiations". I challenged this decision of Pres. O'Brien's based on the reasoning that the ECASD could not possibly be anywhere near "negotiating" with consultants since absolutely no work at all had been done by the ECASD to define the project, the scope, the participants, the goals, the deliverables, nor the timeframe. Also, I am sure that pointing out that the Open Meeting Laws require government meetings to err on the side of being open when there is a question. The 3 firms presented very different approaches to the project, as would be expected when they were not given any sort of guidelines from the client.

Carol Craig shared a one page draft summary of what the ECASD wants to accomplish and what outcomes are expected with predictable categories like Facilities; Elementary, Middle and High School Delivery Systems; Administrative Services; Local and State Taxation issues; and Technology. Again, greater work must be done to develop the framework for the scope of this project.

Here is my take on the CCPP consultants:

Springsted, Inc., Public Sector Advisors was represented by Don Lifto a Senior VP and Director of their Public Education Sector. Their approach was 4 steps: RPCE for Research, Planning, Communication and Evaluation. Mr. Lifto concentrated primarily on the first step of Research with the 2nd step of Planning to be done by another group (Kaufman). This approach was very oriented to referendum passage. It focussed on developing a questionnaire for phone surveys of registered voters to determine what was the political climate and how to frame the referendum to voters. In my opinion, it was an approach that was not usable at this time for our district. It did, however, point out how rinky-dink and pathetic the Spring referendum was in terms of being not much more than a hope and a prayer on the pat of the ECASD BOE and Administration. Mr. Lifto did go into the 2nd step of Planning a bit and that begins to approach what I think our district and community needs now.

School Perceptions was represented by, former Middleton superintendent, Mr. Bill Reis and Mr. Tom Joynt, a Senior Consultant. Their focus took the research stage a little farther with their Survey Methodology Software. This survey technique involves many, many more people responding to questions and the data can be sliced and diced easily to get segment responses (students, teachers, parents, community members, etc...) to understand concerns. The 3 Phase approach would be as follows:

Phase 1: Summer Planning to define and develop the Project Strategy and priorities. Some concern was expressed by Cummins and Craig about the current Administrative "transition". Response was that the BOE and Administrative team must establish the Strategic Priorities. Based on this there could be value to waiting until a permanent Superintendent and Deputy are on board.

Phase 2: Fall Community Engagement to design and conduct the survey and analyze results. This would also help to identify for the district the "expectation gap" (which clearly exists here in Eau Claire) which is the difference between what people want and are willing to pay for and what the ECASD is providing.

Phase 3: Winter Planning for the Future Direction to develop a transition plan that would be evaluated quarterly. This would identify the top 3 to 5 priorities and a continuous process to sustain accomplishing them.

I guess that my thoughts on this presentation are that it goes farther than mere referendum passage but does not fully engage all of the " stakeholders" as active participants in the visioning and identification of priorities and strategic objectives that I have seen in other planning processes. They did identify the following keys to successful Community Engagement as being:
1. Build Ownership in the Process, 2. Educate citizens, 3. Inclusivity, 4. Identify and Mobilize Citizen Leaders and, 5. Use Good Data to develop planning and communication with the community. It just seemed like it was not as fully paticipatory and that it would not create shared responsibility for results in ways I have seen in the past.

The final presenter was Anne Sturdivant from the Latitudes Group. This presentation seemed to me to be the most comprehensive process to get the Planning process jump started and moving forward with everybody on board. From their literature: "The basic characteristic is a session with 50-70 or more people in the room representing multiple stakeholder groups. This group includes all types of community members and all types of school district employees, who come to a common vision of the district's future, strategic priorities and draft action plans for getting there. The advantage is broad-based buy in and ownership of strategic direction and the resultant ability for a school system to respond quickly to changes in public demands, student needs, availability of resources and shifting priorities." Using a very structured format in this large group and mixing up the stakeholders within smaller groups in a day and a half session she has seen great results in diverse community groups coming together. Pres. O'Brien questioned whether individuals would be willing to give up a day and a half for such an event and her response was that she has never heard of anyone objecting to that kind of time for such a valuable and comprehensive effort.

Well, that is my 2 cents on the topic. Clearly, the BOE and Administration have got to get their acts together to move forward and define more specifically their goals to get the best process for our district. Without a permanent Superintendent or Deputy in place, this will likely get put on hold for another year plus. Sadly, so many years were lost while previous BOE and Administrative leaders twiddled their thumbs as the district tanked financially and now we are so far behind on this crucial effort.