Power Tools
As boards and superintendents, you have three powerful change tools at your disposal. They are the policy-making power of the board, the budget-approval authority, and the use of board time in its meetings.
Board Policy
Policy-making authority is granted boards by state law. Within the district, it has the force of law. Policy can be used to set an elementary reading goal. Policy can be used to create a framework which establishes a K-3 reading assessment system, sets the gradually increasing proficiency levels at kindergarten, first, second, and third grades (standards), requires appropriate reports which establish initial baseline, and then measures the annual improvement from the baseline (initial accountability). Alternatively, policy can require the development of a strategic plan which, over several years, phases in the same elementary reading accountability system. Policy can require annual reviews and updating of the plan and the evaluation of personnel against specific strategic plan objectives. Strategic plans provide a flexible way for boards and superintendents to define relatively stable long-term objectives and gradually move a school district toward their achievement with shorter term, more specific annual objectives.
If we want to maintain local control, we must take local responsibility for solving fundamental problems like reading. We cannot not insist on local control while simultaneously asserting that the responsibility for a 25% reading failure rate in third graders lies in our state capitols or in Washington, D.C
School boards and superintendents may consider using Targeting Student Learning: The School Board's Role as Policy Maker as a resource in revising policy. This book is a policy project by the California, Illinois, Maine, Pennsylvania, and Washington State School Directors' Association, $12.00 (360) 493-9239.
Meeting Agenda
How the Board allocates its meeting time sends an unmistakable message throughout the school district and community about what's important. Many Boards rarely spend its time on improving student academic achievement, because three other agendas generally claim a disproportionate amount of time. They are:
the sports agenda
the social programs agenda
the adult educators and institution agenda
A board member or superintendent can determine their actual agenda by calculating the actual time spent in each meeting on each of these four separate agendas.
When board members and superintendents think critically about these four agendas, they may realize that most of their time is spent on the agenda of servicing the needs of adult educators and the institutions with personnel matters (like approving hires and terminations, granting leaves or transfers, negotiating union contracts, providing oversight, and managing grievances), funding (state funding compliance, state and federal grant and funding compliance, bond and levy activities), spending (approving district purchases, managing payroll issue and policies, reviewing facility and new construction plans), and compliance (conforming policy to state and federal regulation, and dealing with the impact of special education regulation on the funding and safety of the rest of the students).
Within the student learning agenda, your most leveraged objective will be assuring that at least 90% of third graders read at or above grade level. It then logically follows that the board and superintendent should increase the amount of time they spend reviewing the elementary reading strategic planning process, checking the timetables, listening to reports on the process of selecting the elementary reading tests, involving themselves in setting the K-3 grade level reading standards, analyzing testing results, and fashioning increasingly effective communication processes and accountability measures.
After baselining last year's use of time among the four agendas, time spent on increasing student achievement should be increased to at least 40%--with at least half of that time earmarked for elementary reading.
Budget
Budget approval is a major power granted by state legislation which a local board and superintendent can use to focus a district on increasing student academic achievement. Most states require that the local board must approve the district budget. More and more districts have moved from a closed budget development process, in which allocating discretionary dollars occurs inside the management team, to an open budget process involving the community, board, and unions. An open budget process enhances the likelihood that spending discretionary dollars aligns with the priorities of the district's strategic plan.
Approval of a budget that funds an assessment director position, reading assessments, elementary reading staff training, and Reading Foundation dues moves elementary reading accountability from the "good idea" stage to actual implementation.
