Letter: Strategic plan is 'compilation of education jargon'

Posted 1/10/18

To the editor:

"Understand, consider, and communicate about our financial impact and contributions to the community." 

This statement is the last bullet point of the draft strategic …

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Letter: Strategic plan is 'compilation of education jargon'

Posted

To the editor:

"Understand, consider, and communicate about our financial impact and contributions to the community." 

This statement is the last bullet point of the draft strategic plan created by the Barrington School District distributed this past week. Recent headaches for the district and school committee have resulted from poor communication with the community, particularly regarding financial decisions. To highlight a few — the BMS building project, implementation of school start time changes and transportation. The lack of prioritization of this item in the plan implies either an impressive lack of awareness or a staggering lack of political will to address the needs and economic concerns repeatedly raised by Barrington residents across the political spectrum in writing and during numerous meetings about the BMS building project and start times, school committee meetings and Financial Town Meetings. The community deserves to be prioritized when it comes to communication about the schools; the town's largest expense category.

Per communication from the district, the goal of the strategic plan process was to "define our collective vision of success, articulate our core values, and set ambitious goals for 2023 in specific priority areas."

Instead of achieving this stated goal, the draft plan more resembles a compilation of education jargon. I believe all parties involved have best intentions. However, the plan doesn’t fulfill the needs of the community which paid for a tailored, evidence-based, forward-looking plan to guide the next five years. The town has not remotely received its money's worth for this plan. The plan isn’t robust enough to do what was intended and would not hold the administration accountable for doing anything new over the next five years. It demonstrates a lack of commitment to true action and holds disappointingly little strategic thought.

I’m confident that all involved in the process provided ample feedback to inform a viable plan for the district. None of that wisdom is reflected in the document nor is there evidence of any guiding framework. Whether it was a result of the tamping down of information through the committee process, or the reluctance of the facilitators to help the community commit to addressing thorny issues in the face of pressure, Barrington will not be well-served settling for what has been provided.

We invest an impressive amount of resources raising and educating the next generation, as we well should. Ideally, a strong strategic plan would provide a roadmap to guide the community, students and families into the future. The current plan doesn't come anywhere close to doing that.

The district has provided an online survey for students, parents, families, employees, and all community members as well as the draft strategic plan itself. These are available via the district website.

I urge all Barrington residents to review the plan and respond to the survey by the Jan. 12 deadline as well as emailing any additional feedback to the school committee and administration so that “understanding, considering, and communicating about our financial impact and contributions to the community” isn’t simply an afterthought of this strategic plan process.

Liana Cassar

Barrington

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