School Board Talk-3 Public Input Policies

I've been trying to start a  introspective dialog here on this blog on how school boards work, and how school board's should work.  My goal is to share nearly 15 years of board experience and to provide a resource where others who really care about the proper function of school boards might do some deep thinking on board governance.  This is the second post on the topic of public comments at school board meetings. Today's post provides some examples of actual board policies on public comment.   Many of these policies liberally allow citizens to interject themselves into a school board meeting, and my view on these policies is that they are a misapplication of resources, and inconsistent with the school board's primary functions.

In another post, I want to talk about some actual studies on effective school boards.  I'm going to suggest that a great deal of board activity diverges from what is desperately needed in public education today: a school board that spends most of its efforts on accountability, on strategic policy guidance, and on stimulating educational excellence.   There are so many opportunities to evade this important goal, and some school administrators would much rather have boards waste their time on listening to mindless pointless comments, than actually trying to focus on whether their district is measuring up.    When we think about school governance, we ought to be thinking about how a board of education adds value, and not merely go through the motions of what we think a school board is supposed to do. 

Suppose at public comment the first citizen speaks for three minutes on why we should have less testing in our public schools.  Suppose the second citizen, and three others, come to complain about the format of graduation.  Suppose then another citizen comes to urge that the district hire more teachers of color,  and then finally, two student gymnast urge the board to put more money into the gymnastics program in next year's budget. And so on.  Is this a wise use of time, and how does it add value to the district's ultimate success?

For each of these example comments, after the comment is presented, the chair is likely to say, in a perfunctory  manner, thank you for your comment, we don't discuss public comments at this meeting, someone from the superintendent's office will get back to you.   How then has the time been well used:   Wouldn't it have been more effective for the citizen upset with testing to send an email to the curriculum director, or to the full board, or to stop by the principals office?  Why isn't there an administrative system for the school leadership, or the activities leadership,  to hear concerns from students about activities? 

Nonetheless, school boards governing very large school districts often provide liberal opportunities for what they call "the public" to speak.  The Minneapolis School Board conducts public comment from 5:30 to 6:15 once per month.  Comments may address any topic, including issues pending before the board that evening.  The rules limit five persons on any given topic, but at times, the media reports suggest that a larger group will attend en masse and convince the board to diverge from standard procedure. At the budget meeting this year, 31 delegations were received.  Thirty one persons from a city with a population of 413,000, and a school district serving 30,000 students.  If the Minneapolis school board upset its budget because 31 speakers with a group of angry sign holding citizens represented the families of 30,000 students, is that really good governance.

The Minneapolis rules distinguish between comments and "delegations."  A delegation is a comment delivered on an agenda topic that is to be discussed at that evening's meeting.   Minneapolis's rules require persons wishing to speak during the comment period to register for a comment or for a delegation.   In addition, board policy contains a discretionary delegation process upon request during the meeting.

The Minnesota School Board's Association created two really confusing model board policies, standard policy 206 and 207.   The two policies taken together create a rather poorly crafted set of rules that desperately need a complete rewrite.   The policies seem to encourage interruptions to interject comments at the drop of a hat: whatever could that be for? 

If your school district has adopted model policies 206 and 207, both of which seem to address public comments, you may wonder why two policies. And, if you read policy 206, you will be puzzled, I bet, at the insertion of what appears to be extraneous material on data privacy sitting right there in the middle of a public hearing and complaint policy.

My basic concern here is that taking random public comment in a large school district with ten thousand students or more, and using those comments to somehow guide governance is simply foolish.   I would argue that what the board is doing, really, is holding public comment, as a way of pretending that it is providing an effective forum for public comment, to fend of criticism. 

The Des Moines school district liberally allows public comment on items that are pending before the board.   As an experiment, if you disagree with my position on the benefit of public comment, you can actually watch an example (click the link) of what the Des Moines board hears at these sessions.

The Omaha school board has the following liberal public comment policy:

Members  of   the  public  will  be  permitted  to  speak  at  Board  meetings  at  which  a  public comment  is on the Agenda, and may speak during the time at which the public comment agenda  item  is  being  addressed .  Members  of  the  public  may  also  speak  when  invited  to make a presentation or when recognized by the chair.  The Board is not required to allow members  of  the  public  to  speak  at  each  meeting.  However,  the  Board  will not forbid public participation at all meetings. 

What is the matter with the administration of the Des Moines school district that people need to come to the board to get their views heard? 

In most of our school districts, our teaching of social studies, mathematics, and for many students reading, is broken.   Our English Language Learners aren't learning English fast enough.   We aren't making adequate progress on closing the achievement gap.    Why are we wasting our time listening to public comments about issues that are mostly operational, and mostly don't go to the heart of what we need to do to transform public education. 

If you disagree, drop me a line.   More to come.