School District 27 trustees are seeking the public’s help in reviewing several major issues facing the district.
The stakeholder engagement process is being facilitated by the Rossland-based company thoughtexchange and will involve e-mail input, says Superintendent Mark Thiessen.
“All staff and most parents will receive an e-mail in the next couple of days that will invite them to be a part of the engagement process,” Thiessen says.
“If parents or community members do not receive an e-mail but would like to add their input, they can visit the district’s website (www.sd27.bc.ca), and click on the relevant link.
“They will be taken to a landing page where they can register for the thoughtexchange process.”
District staff, parents, secondary students and the community at large are being asked to provide input and comments to assist the board and district operations staff in setting new goals and priorities in the following areas of operation:
• Review of the major reconfiguration of schools that took place in 2013.
• Creating a new strategic plan to guide the work of the trustees over their next four years in office.
• Creating a new Student Achievement Plan for the next three years. (2015/16-2018/19).
• Reviewing the district’s proposed new Community Use of Facilities policy which is in the process of being developed.
The first part of the process is called Share and involves inviting people to provide their thoughts and questions by e-mail and district website links.
This is a 14-day process that will run from April 2 to 12. Between April 13 and 21 staff will moderate the input received.
Inappropriate comments (libellous) will be flagged for removal and shared with individuals making these comments for review.
During the next Star phase that runs April 22 to May 1 people will be invited by e-mail and website links to prioritize their thoughts by assigning stars to suggestions they feel are most important.
Thiessen notes that people can participate in the Star phase even if they didn’t participate in the Share phase of the process.
By mid-May the process will enter the Discover stage where reports and results of input will be shared with identified focus groups and then go out to the community.
Reports and results may also be customized for both internal and external use, and shared through a custom website.