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Comments to the School Board

January 13, 2010

The new calendar year promises to bring another round of highly emotional situations and important decisions. The PTAs across the district would like to ask you, the school board,  to be very deliberate and forthcoming in keeping the community informed throughout the spring. For example, we know budget cuts are happening at the State level but how will they affect our district? 

  • Let the community know what is coming up, possible solutions being looked into, and possible consequences.
  • Let the community know what is currently happening at the moment it is happening. And,
  • Let the community know the affects after the decisions  - how are our schools managing? what sort of feedback have you received?

We have heard positive comments throughout our community of how much your efforts were appreciated last year. That round of budget cuts was certainly difficult and the RIFing of teachers hard to understand, but the communication was very helpful about what potential cuts were coming and the timing around those cuts. We ask that you continue this transparent communication in an open and honest manner with the entire community.

The linkage meetings in the South (at Maywood Middle School on Jan. 19 from 7-9pm), Central (at Clark Elementary School, date TBD) and North (at Pacific Cascade FC/MS, date TBD) will be great opportunities to engage in 2-way conversations around some of the concerns of the community – both big and small. We appreciate the opportunity to partner with the School Board on this communication tool and hope that there will be other ways we can work together to keep our community informed.

A community educated on the facts can move faster to solutions and innovative ideas and are more receptive to change.