Improving attendance, communication and preparing for future growth are some of the School Board’s goals for the next five years.

The board discussed what goals are important to focus on during a special meeting Wednesday as the district creates a new five-year strategic plan.

Board member Joe Hurla said communication is one of the district’s biggest challenges.

“I think that we are not as effective as we could be at putting out communication to the community,” Hurla said. “We could look for and come up with a way to do that more effectively.”

Superintendent Stu Moeckel agreed it’s important to create a better communication plan to ensure administrators, teachers, parents and students all have an idea about what is happening.

“Trying to get them the information they need, when they want it, in a way they want it,” Moeckel said.

As part of the communication goal, the board is looking to prioritize keeping students engaged. By doing so, board member Claire Harding said the district may be able to improve attendance.

“That’s what my focus is,” Harding said. “Lowering our absenteeism rate from 18.6, the district average, to below 10. That’s lofty, but I think we can do it by keeping kids engaged.”

The board also decided on three other goals to focus on: better preparing students for life after graduation, academic improvement and planning for future growth.

Board member Zach Brooks said it’s important to give post-secondary students all of the options they need to get to where they want to go.

Hurla suggested setting a goal for all students to graduate with 18 college credit hours, a trade certificate or two years of working experience.

“The goal would be that every single student have one of those three things. That’s trying to make sure, wherever people are headed, they are prepared for that,” Hurla said.

In terms of academic improvement, Harding said she wants to see the district continue setting goals for reading and math assessments. 

“I like what we’re doing by saying 80% is our assessment score goal for reading and math,” Harding said. 

Board president Mark Chrislip said he would like to be able to see real-time data of how students are performing. 

Moeckel said the district’s hope is that board members will have access to the data often. 

“Our goal is that every quarter you will see it and our community can see it,” Moeckel said. 

Chrislip also brought up the final goal of preparing for future growth as the Panasonic factory opens.

Moeckel said the goal of planning for growth could include things like developing more programming or increasing staffing.

Moeckel said the district leadership team and academic teams will look at the board’s goals and create a strategy for how the district can measure those goals in the new strategic plan. 

The district leadership team will put the plan together, taking into account the board’s conversation.

A draft of the strategic plan will be presented to the board at August’s meeting. Moeckel said the board should come to a final agreement on the plan by September’s meeting. 

Reach reporter Ryn Drummond at [email protected]

To donate to support our community journalism, please go to this link: tinyurl.com/y4u7stxj