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There has been quite a hullabaloo about my motion last Wednesday to review the policy regarding committee interaction with school staff. (For context, check LiL and a video of the meeting, yesterday’s Column, and an earlier article by Jenn Myers.) Whether I am “on a mission” as one colleague muses, I admit it freely: Yes! I am on a mission to improve our schools. I do that by getting information from all levels of the system, from pre-k to the high school, from administrators, parents, students, teachers, custodians, security officers, community partners—you name it; if they’re involved with our students, I want to learn their perspective and use it to improve our schools. I am always respectful, professional, and mindful of the boundaries. What’s not clear is the protocol, especially when my understanding turns out to be different from an administrator’s, and my colleagues have varying approaches. Access to good information is critical. It becomes even more serious when it is curtailed, as indicated by one administrator insisting all questions to his staff be made in his presence—regardless of chain-of-command approval in his absence or the nature of the questions. (In this case, the question was what the recycling club needed from the city, and the visit included, at the invitation of a teacher, watching a science experiment for five minutes.)

One colleague suggested that staff may feel “threatened” and not “want to speak” with us, and that may happen to certain members. In my experience, people welcome the opportunity to share their ideas and concerns when it is for informational purposes and is asked in a non-threatening way. Far more alarming, however, is the idea that staff may be discouraged, even forbidden, from sharing insights with us. That is not a model for good management, nor does it help move the schools forward. Fortunately, we’re not talking about a private business, we’re talking about our public schools, funded by taxpayers to educate our children under the leadership (and scrutiny) of an elected school committee. As the motion requests, we will clarify the policy so we may continue to be effective at improving our schools. For some questions that have helped me in the past, see:

 Some typical questions I’ve asked of staff:

1. What do you need?
2. How is this program working or not for your students? (regarding OneLowell truancy program) Are you getting the information you need? How could the program work better? (asked LHS housemasters, and middle schools)
3. What impact has this cut (preschool transportation) had on your student population?
4. If we brought Planned Parenthood’s sex education curriculum to the middle schools, are you comfortable with the staff you have available to teach it? (The results of that question, which I asked the Supt, middle-school principals, science, gym, and health teachers, prompted the creation of a Task Force of Lowell educators to study sex education curriculum and instruction options, and make recommendations to the School Committee—in progress.)
5. How are the math interventions working? What are the obstacles for implementation? What changes have you seen in student achievement in math? (asked middle school principals and math teachers, as well as LHS administrators and math teachers)

This entry was posted on Monday, March 9th, 2009 at 5:36 am and is filed under Education, Lowell High, school committee. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.