What i have learned
School Board Service
My experience on the St. Helens School Board was very rewarding and educational. I learned a lot - but I learned almost as much in my last six months on the board as I did in the eleven and a half years prior.
Here are some of my key takeaways.
To the left (or above) is a flyer. I made it. I'm advocating for it (or something like it) to become an Oregon Administrative Rule (OAR). Much like the Foster Bill Of Rights our children need to be empowered to advocate for themselves. A required posting in every school classroom, and a quarterly teaching of the process should be mandatory in all schools throughout the state - and nation.
Our students and families didn't know how to follow chain of command.
The board didn't know that there was a culture of containment.
Many also believed that there was a central system where everyone knew everything, which is not true. Your school board does not see sensitive information unless it is appealed to them through the appeal process. Even then, it's privileged information and there are rules and laws to protect students, families and staff.
Boards are elected by the community to represent the thoughts and opinions of the citizens within. They have essentially a special ticket to ask the hard questions first, and the district has a requirement to engage them in the process of steering the direction of the district as a whole.
We, parents and the board members alike, don't know what we don't know. We, parents and our children, need a way to communicate through a process that allows us to be heard no matter what!
Budget.
When I first started on the school board the ending fund balance was at 11%. We moved it to 7% pretty quickly so that we could support students better and lower classroom numbers. Then, after COVID we were at 3%. School funding is unpredictable, but COVID changed the landscape. Most districts (and even our County), did not save the ARPA money, instead they used it for what was probably valuable supports but we should have been using a business lens. The world economic forces have created challenges in all forms of governments.
As a board we had advocated for free lunches, reduced sports fees, facilities rental partnerships, and many other benefits to our students and their families.
We should have course corrected sooner.
Superintendent.
Because we were engaged in creating healthy programs we were monopolizing our superintendent's time. We acknowledged that our superintendent needed an assistant superintendent during the prior budget season, and it was decided to wait until the next year. The SHSD now has an assistant superintendent. It's an investment that not everyone will agree with however I agree with this decision for the overall health of the district.
Thank you for reading. There are many other takeaways, and I will continue to add content as I am able to articulate it carefully and accurately, as per my experience and opinions.
Contact Me
I'm happy to answer more questions. Send me an email and let me know what else you would like to know about.