Wendy Hart: ASD School Board

Common Core: Where Are We Getting Our Assessments?

2012-01-28T00:23:00.000-07:00

(This is the fourth of eight blogs on Common Core. For previous blogs, click here: Intro, Point 1, Point 2)

3. Common Core proponents say that the standards do not determine assessments.

In discussing Common Core (CCSS) , I have had proponents say things like, "It's just standards. It doesn't dictate testing or curriculum". Standards will require testing aligned with those standards. So, who is involved in creating those tests? After three days of blogs on this subject, I assume no one will be surprised by the answer...the Federal Government. The US Department of Education is funding the assessments for the Common Core.

Many of you have read my first blog on this topic. Some of it will be repeated here, for clarity. In short, the US Department of Education gave a grant of $330,000,000 to two consortia to develop assessments. The Smarter Balance Consortia (SBAC) is the one Utah belongs to, along with about 30 other states. The assessments are to be computer-adaptive and available in 2014. Computer-adaptive tests use a series of more detailed questions to determine the knowledge of the test-taker. For example, if you answer an initial question correctly, the subsequent question goes into greater depth and so on.

An emphasis is being placed on the testing by US Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan. He said:

As I travel around the country the number one complaint I hear from teachers is that state bubble tests pressure teachers to teach to a test that doesn't measure what really matters... Both of these winning applicants are planning to develop assessments that will move us far beyond this and measure real student knowledge and skills.

One concern with this approach is the SBAC consortium doesn't appear to focus on content knowledge. While there is concrete knowledge included in the Common Core Standards, the emphasis in all the meetings I've attended, and apparently in the assessments, has been on processes and communication instead of content.

Dr. W. Stephen Wilson, a professor of mathematics and education at Johns Hopkins University, reviewed the assessment plan for Smarter Balance. He is concerned by the emphasis on mathematical processes over actual math knowledge and skills. (Read his full comments here.) Dr. Wilson says:

The conceptualization of mathematical understanding on which SBAC will base its assessments is deeply flawed. The consortium focuses on the Mathematical Practices of the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSS-M) at the expense of content, and they outline plans to assess communication skills that have nothing to do with mathematical understanding....

Mathematical Practices, or what was usually called “process” standards in most states, do little more than describe how someone pretty good at mathematics seems to approach mathematics problems. As stand alone standards, they are neither teachable nor testable. Mathematics is about solving problems, and anyone who can solve a complex multi-step problem using mathematics automatically demonstrates their skill with the Mathematical Practices, (whether they can communicate well or not)....

Ultimately, the actual assessments will tell us all what SBAC thinks is important.... It appears that the assessments will focus on communication skills and Mathematical Practices over content knowledge. [emphasis mine]

Another critique said:

Both [CCSS assessment] consortia appear poised to develop subjective assessments rather than objective tests. SBAC plans to assess deep disciplinary understanding and higher-order thinking skills. Will either PARCC or SBAC test student content knowledge and skill? [emphasis mine]

Additionally, I was able to review some sample test questions. I saw a lot of free-text, explain-your-answer questions. Let me give you one example.

First, you have a 4-paragraph description of a family concerned with their gas bill and a page of the bill.

Part A: Using a free text response: Assess the cost-effectiveness of new insulation by researching "heating degree days" on the internet. The response must include:
Compare the heating costs from Jan. 2007 to Jan. 2008
Explain the savings after the insulation
Identify circumstances under which the Jan. 2008 bill would have been at least 10% less than the Jan. 2007 bill
Decide if the insulation was cost-effective and provide evidence of this
Part B: Create a short pamphlet from the gas company to guide customers in increased energy efficiency:
List the quantities the customers need to consider in assessing cost-effectiveness
Generalize a method of comparison used for the gas bills with a set of formulas, and provide an explanation of the formulas
Explain to customers how to weigh the cost of energy efficiency measures with savings on their bill
Then upload your pamphlet...to the computer for grading.

While this might be a good classroom exercise, this is a math test, remember? I don't even want to go into how a computer accurately grades something like this. I assume the program is looking for certain numbers and words in the response, but there are so many variables to how one answers this. One computer science person stated he is familiar with the capabilities of natural language programs and worried this would exceed those capabilities. In short, our kids may not be able to do math problems, but, at least, they'll be able to explain about the math problems and make pretty pamphlets.

I haven't even gotten into Language Arts yet. There are more concerns about the Language Arts assessments, not the least of which is the writing piece. How does one effectively measure writing without a human involved? I will go into my concerns with Language Arts in greater detail when I address curriculum next time.

Assessments will drive the curriculum. We will teach what is on the tests. It is important to know who is writing the tests and what they are evaluating. Who are the people involved in SBAC? What are their backgrounds, their biases and their agendas? How do we prevent these biases and agendas from spilling over into our very verbose computerized tests? The assessments are too big of a player to turn over to some "experts" and the Federal government.

Two additional points of concern are peripherally connected to the assessments.

First, some people feel they don't need to worry because they homeschool, or go to private school or send their kids to charters. Well, the charter schools are treated the same as the district schools when it comes to standards and assessments: they're going Common Core. But home and private schools may not be free and clear either. The Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) is concerned with not just the influence of Common Core on public schools, but private and home schoolers, as well. Congress reauthorizes their Elementary and Secondary Education Authorization (ESEA) bill every year. The ESEA is the main way the feds create their own standards for our schools and appropriate funding for education to a large degree. This year's version has made HSLDA very nervous. In short:

In addition, one provision in the Senate’s bill mandates that any state taking federal funds must put in place “College and Career Ready Aligned Standards.” Mandating that each state have aligned standards with aligned coursework will guarantee the creation of national academic standards, national curriculum, and national testing. We believe this will result in the eventual requirement that homeschoolers use these national standards, curriculum, and testing. [emphasis mine]

A few years ago when ESEA created No Child Left Behind (NCLB), Utah tried to opt-out of federal education dollars and the NCLB constraints. The feds responded that we could go ahead and do that, but they would provide NO federal funding to the state. That means we wouldn't lose just the education dollars, but road funds, Medicare, Medicaid, etc. Given the above ESEA concerns, the state would be forced to forgo $5.2 Billion or "ensure", through state law, that all education venues (public, home, private) meet "College and Career Ready" standards and assessments, aka Common Core.

The other concern has to do with privacy and data collection. As part of the stimulus bill, the US Department of Education (DOE) has required the states to create longitudinal data systems. The idea is that your child's information is tracked from preschool through college. This will allow for greater information for research in education. How does this tie in to Common Core?

The Common Core standards were the vehicle to get the longitudinal database. … They want to get all these systems where they interconnect. … The data sets already exist and are coded.

To protect your child's privacy, the feds have a rule called FERPA (Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act). Currently, certain people (e.g. elected school board members administrators) can view personally identifiable information (PII) about your child. Any data the school collects, they can have access to. Up until this month, they did not have the right to share that information, except under very specific circumstances. Now, this data can be shared, without your consent, to bureaucrats in other agencies or private organizations as "authorized representatives".

Thus, for example, a school may turn over PII to DOE as part of regular procedure and not be told that DOE is disclosing that data to a research company. And if the school discovered, and objected to, the redisclosure, DOE would not even have to point to an express legal authority for its action.

Read more about these concerns here, realizing this was written prior to the adoption of these new FERPA standards.

And just to make you even more comfortable, here's more information about data collection on students.

Under regulations the Obama Department of Education released this month, these scenarios could become reality. The department has taken a giant step toward creating a de facto national student database that will track students by their personal information from preschool through career. Although current federal law prohibits this, the department decided to ignore Congress and, in effect, rewrite the law. Student privacy and parental authority will suffer.

How did it happen? Buried within the enormous 2009 stimulus bill were provisions encouraging states to develop data systems for collecting copious information on public-school kids. To qualify for stimulus money, states had to agree to build such systems according to federally dictated standards. So all 50 states either now maintain or are capable of maintaining extensive databases on public-school students.

The administration wants this data to include much more than name, address and test scores. According to the National Data Collection Model, the government should collect information on health-care history, family income and family voting status. In its view, public schools offer a golden opportunity to mine reams of data from a captive audience. [emphasis mine]

To view the pieces of information to be collected, including religious consideration and diseases, illnesses, etc. go here.

The Feds are incentivizing the assessments, but do we have to adopt them? Not yet. Our agreement with SBAC says we will contribute to their consortium. There is no statement of obligation to the tests, I am told. However, in a discussion with a State Office (USOE) employee, she said there would be no reason to belong to the consortium unless we implemented Common Core now and were able to give feedback on the assessments. Some of the State Board of Education members do not want us to adopt SBAC because of the costs and/or concerns about the content of the assessments. They are supportive of the Common Core standards, but would like Utah to develop its own assessments. Another USOE employee stated that the USOE/State Board will select the questions for the assessments from a database of those created by SBAC.  Also, one of our USOE employees is high up in the SBAC consortium. The assumption is that those USOE employees will effectively screen anything that doesn't maintain Utah values from the assessments.  They say there is no need to worry, and we will always be able to back out.

Having said that, why am I bothering to give you this information? It's all good, and if it isn't, we can opt out at a future date. I believe my role is to give you the information, both the positive and the negative.  The positive is already out there. But there's always a downside. We, the people, need to be empowered to make our own decisions and hold our elected officials accountable. Providing only one side of the story is not sufficient. There are pros to Common Core, but there are also cons. You need to see both sides, make your own decisions, and then act on those decisions.

There are, at least, three entities you should contact about Common Core: the State School Board, your legislators, and the governor.

First, you need to let the State School Board know of your concerns and that you are watching the assessment process very closely.  Utah should not have signed on to a program without data (or textbooks) to back it up. What concrete protections are they putting in place against encroachment by the Feds or even areas of concern in the standards and assessments when accepting things from other states?

Second, your legislators need to be aware of and remove (if found) any direct references to Common Core, SBAC (Smarter Balance) or standards from a consortium of states in any of the legislation that may discuss education standards or assessments. This could be a backdoor approach for enshrining Common Core into law. (It currently is only the policy of the State School Board; not the law of the State.) They need to know if you favor Utah creating its own assessments. The legislators also need to be asked about the protections they will be putting in place to prevent Federal overreach into the area of education. Education is a state issue, not a Federal one. We should not be willing to grant that authority to any government or organization outside of Utah. If (or should I say, When) the Feds use their power of the purse to 'encourage' us to tow the line, we need to already have legislation in place to prevent them, other states, or outside organizations from dictating our standards, assessments, or curricula.

Third, the governor signed on to Common Core. He needs to hear of your concerns as well.

Please know, however, it requires some digging to find this information I'm presenting. Those who decided on this were presented only the roses of Common Core, not the thorns.

In conclusion, the Feds are paying two consortia to develop assessments. These assessments appear to test communication and processes over actual content knowledge or skills. Additionally, several pieces of legislation and DOE regulations could require all students to meet Common Core standards (often phrased as college- and career-ready) and take Common Core tests. Finally, using the vehicle of Common Core, we have a nice data-collection system. I don't believe this is what the State School Board had in mind when they adopted the Common Core standards, but this is what it has become. We have sacrificed the principle of local and parental control on the alter of (supposed) better educational outcomes and a desire to keep up with "other states". We will reap the rewards of less control and greater bureaucracy with no guarantee of the original outcome. There is never a right way to do the wrong thing.

Common Core: From the Governors...No Feds Allowed

2012-01-25T11:31:00.000-07:00

(This is the third in a series of eight on Common Core. Click to read the introduction or the first point.)

2. Developed by the Governors: State-Led Initiative

In reading the Common Core website, I can appreciate why our State School Board and so many of our education leaders in Utah are drawn to the idea of Common Core. Who doesn't want our kids to learn more? On so many levels, it seems good to make sure all kids are taught specific things in each grade. We want all Utah's children to have a quality education, regardless of school district. We also want to know Utah isn't falling behind other states. The problem with this thought is what it opens us up to. As Congressman (and former Utah public school teacher) Rob Bishop stated in this video on Common Core, "Ever since the Federal Government, in the mid-sixties, became heavily involved in public education, we've been consistently fighting that battle over standardization versus freedom. Freedom should be our goal." If freedom is your goal, please read on.

Yesterday, I had the privilege of attending a legislative committee hearing on HB15: Computer-adaptive testing (Cost: $6.7M). It was amended to remove a direct reference to the Common Core standards. During the hearing, State School Board President Debra Roberts said something to the effect that Common Core was developed by the Governors' Association. She mentioned, in brief, some of the benefits the State School Board saw. But, she went on to say that the Federal government had gotten involved and, essentially, messed it up. (I'm paraphrasing, but if someone wants to find the audio link, I'll post it.) My point exactly. This structure was created by the states for the states' own use. However, it is perfectly created for the more powerful entity, the Federal Government, to take over and remove all semblance of local control. This is why every presentation has to begin with "It's not a Federal Program." To which I respond, "If you build it, they will come."

Common Core was 'developed' by the National Governors' Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). In Utah, our chief state school officer is the State Superintendent. We are told it isn't a Federal program because the Governors all came together and decided to create these standards. We are left with the impression of the governors hitting upon this great idea and going to work on it. In fact, many of these ideas have been around for 20 years, waiting for an opportunity to gain traction. The idea was presented to them, and the governors signed on. Most of the heavy-lifting was done by other organizations, some with financial grants and some with long-term desires to implement a national education to jobs program. (For an interesting video and research paper on some of the entities and monies involved, go here.)

First, let's address the money. Since we don't really think the fifty governors were sitting around designing math and language arts standards, who, exactly was involved? Well, the NGA has a separate arm called the NGA Center for Best Practices. This organization has staff who are involved with researching, investigating, and promoting policies on behalf of the Governors' Association. The NGA Center has several divisions of which education is only one. When we say, "developed by the governors", we need to understand we are referring to this Center with its education-division employees. The CCSSO is the other organization usually linked to Common Core development. In association with the NGA and the CCSSO, however, is the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE). The NCEE provided some of the main people who spearheaded the Common Core Initiative, some of whom worked on previous standards initiatives, including the New Standards Consortium. So, this is the main group behind Common Core standards.

These Common Core developers, interestingly enough, each received grants from the Gates Foundation to develop and implement Common Core.

Here are the amounts, as per the Gates Foundation website, of years and grants to each of the above organizations.

CCSSO: 2009--$9,961,842, 2009--$3,185,750, 2010--$743,331, 2011--$9,388,911
NGA Center: 2008--$2,259,780
NCEE: 2009--$1,500,000
Total: $27,000,000

In fact, quite a few entities have received Gates Foundation money to develop, implement, and provide support for Common Core. Please see the pdf link here. (I have gone through the pdf download, and checked the Gates Foundation website. Some of the links listed are no longer valid, and some of the grants have been combined. It took some digging, but I was able to find links on the Gates Foundation website for all of the entities listed, with roughly equal or larger donation amounts, as in the diagram. I encourage you to do your own research on this, as well.) For an interesting list, you should search the grants from http://www.gatesfoundation.org/ and limit your search to College-ready education (US) and 2009 or prior. Not all of these are directly related to Common Core (as far as I can tell), but many of them are. 2009 is when the Common Core-related grants begin. It is fascinating to see how much money and to whom it was donated.

Additionally, the major textbook publisher, Pearson Publishing, has received $2,999,047 from the Gates Foundation to create materials for the Common Core. Not inconsequentially, Pearson recently acquired America's Choice, a subsidiary of the NCEE. I'm not saying that the money is bad or the Gates Foundation money is problematic, I just think we need to be aware of the money behind this initiative. Money talks and we need to understand its influence. It isn't as simple as saying the governors of the fifty states got together and came up with this great idea called Common Core.

So, who spearheaded this initiative? Marc Tucker is the president of NCEE and helped establish America's Choice, now part of Pearson Publishing. Mr. Tucker has been very involved in standards-based education over the last 20 or so years. He is very interested in cradle-to-grave education leading to careers (as he calls it human resources development) overseen by the government. He started the New Standards Consortium (that sounds vaguely like Common Core) in the nineties. Here are some quotes from a letter read into the Congressional record by Congressman Bob Shaffer on Sept, 17, 1998. Although the letter is addressed to Hillary Clinton, the concepts appear to be the same ideas that motivated Mr. Tucker and the NCEE in their Common Core Initiative.

We think the great opportunity you have is to remold the entire American System for human resources development...

First, a vision of the kind of national—not federal—human resources development system the nation could have. This is interwoven with a new approach to governing that should inform that vision. What is essential is that we create a seamless web of opportunities, to develop one’s skills that literally extends from cradle to grave and is the same system for everyone—young and old, poor and rich, worker and full-time student....

Radical changes in attitudes, values and beliefs are required to move any combination of these agendas. The federal government will have little direct leverage on many of the actors involved. For much of what must be done a new, broad consensus will be required. What role can the new administration play in forging that consensus and how should it go about doing it? At the narrowest level, the agenda cannot be moved unless there is agreement among the governors, the President and the Congress. [emphasis mine]

To read the entire letter in the Congressional Record, go to page E1819, lower right corner here.

I mention this information to provide context for the Common Core Standards. Mr. Tucker has been advocating standards-based and outcome-based education for over 20 years. His group has created other off-shoot groups that have become involved in many aspects of the education establishment, and currently Common Core. Remember, his goal appears to be the government perfectly managing the education and human resources system of our nation. This is not just about better math standards.

I understand how, given the basic information of the governors developing Common Core, higher standards, greater accountability, and better assessments, our good representatives on the State Board and across our state (and nation) could see a bright educational future for our children. I don't doubt that the original concept of Common Core was a noble idea. However, Americans have always seen education as the responsibility of the families. Local schools exist to support and assist the families in this endeavor. The state's traditional (pre-1984) responsibility was to aid the parents and local schools in that local effort. We have gradually switched focus from a local approach to ceding our responsibility to "experts" successively farther and farther away from our local families. We justify it in the name of outcome. But we have not seen good fruits from those distant laborers. Common Core, whatever its intentions, has become the ultimate top-down approach. Unfortunately, the more power you give away, the less you retain for yourself. In signing on to Common Core, we were shown only the idea of a state-led initiative, without realizing all the forces behind it. If you build the Common Core standards and assessments in 47 states, the Feds WILL come...and, in fact, they already have. Utah needs to opt-out before it becomes too difficult to do so.

Common Core is NOT a Federal Program...technically

2012-01-24T00:59:00.001-07:00

(This is the first point of several blogs about my research into Common Core. To read the introduction, click here.)

1. Federal Control:

At every presentation on Common Core I've attended, the first thing the presenter says is, "There are a lot of myths about Common Core. The first thing you need to know is that Common Core is NOT a Federal Program". Common Core was not developed as a federal program. I realize that. I am more concerned about what it will develop INTO, and not who did what at the outset. We are placing a noose around ourselves that will enable the Federal Government to exercise extensive control over our education. We are lulled by the promise of better education, higher test scores, and more competition in a global marketplace. But we are blind to the power that will remove whatever vestiges of local control we still have. Even if this is a wonderful set of standards, setting ourselves up for greater Federal control is a mistake.

Technically, the US Department of Education did not develop the Common Core Standards. However, with 45+ states involved, it IS a national program. From the Common Core website:

Q: What is the role of the federal government in standards implementation?

A: The federal government has had no role in the development of the common core state standards and will not have a role in their implementation.

However, the federal government will have the opportunity to support states as they begin adopting the standards. For example, the federal government can

Support this effort through a range of tiered incentives, such as providing states with greater flexibility in the use of existing federal funds, supporting a revised state accountability structure, and offering financial support for states to implement the standards.
Provide long-term financial support for the development and implementation of common assessments, teacher and principal professional development, and research to help continually improve the common core state standards over time.
Revise and align existing federal education laws with the lessons learned from the best of what works in other nations and from research. [emphasis mine]

Nope. Not a Federal program, right? So, the Feds control the purse strings AND the legislation. They can 'encourage' any way they see fit. Currently, US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has indicated that states will be granted waivers from meeting the current No Child Left Behind (NCLB) standards, if they are "transitioning students, teachers, and schools to a system aligned with college- and career-ready standards for all students," read Common Core. One article indicated that they must adopt, not only the standards, but also the full complement of assessments, as well. Glad we're not talking about a Federal program.

The two assessment consortia, Smarter Balance (SBAC) and PARCC, split a grant of $330,000,000 from the US Department of Education to create the assessments. (You can read my original blog on the assessments here.) Once the assessments are in place, the curriculum will follow. The assessments are not just the end-of-the-year tests, but also "formative" tests. These would include intermediate tests along the way to help teachers evaluate their students' on-going progress. So, it's not enough we have to pass the state-mandated, federally-funded, end-of-the-year tests, but we get those chapter tests in between.

Additionally, it isn't hard to imagine how the Federal Government could use standards and the results of national (because that's what they are) assessments to reward or punish states and schools. As the FAQ says, the Federal Government will be able to "revise and align existing federal education law" as well as being able to "help...improve the common core state standards over time." The Feds didn't develop the standards, but they will help improve them.

Utah is aligned with SBAC, whose head researcher, Linda Darling-Hammond, was rumored to be on the short list for US Secretary of Education or deputy Secretary of Education. In February, 2009, she declined, saying, "I wanted to let you know that several things have converged in the last two weeks to persuade me to stay in California and support the President's agenda from here." She stated there was a new Policy Center opportunity "that will examine a variety of education redesign issues, including standards and assessments". As the head researcher for the SBAC assessment consortium, it isn't hard to infer that those "standards and assessments" were referencing Common Core. I'm sure the assessments will "support the President's agenda".

Also, the Obama Administration implemented the Race to the Top (RTTT) Program. Originally, Secretary Arne Duncan made adoption of the Common Core a requirement for RTTT applications. As things went along, it wasn't a requirement for application, but those states that adopted Common Core got more points for "adopting common standards" and "developing and implementing high-quality assessments". Utah adopted Common Core, which allowed us to hedge our bets on RTTT funding. It didn't pay off.

So yes, technically, the Common Core is not a Federal program. Legally, it can't be because the US Department of Education is prohibited, by law, from directing, supervising or controlling curriculum or selection of content, textbooks, etc. (I think we know why Ms. Darling-Hammond felt the assessment consortia would accomplish the President's agenda better than the US Department of Ed.) It begs the question, where there's funding, how can there not be direction? If RTTT "prefers" states and issues waivers to those who adopt Common Core, is that not implicit direction and control?

Common Core is not a Federal program. But the US Department of Education is very heavily invested in making sure as many of the states implement Common Core as possible. They will use every incentive, both legislative and monetary, to "encourage" us to adopt and implement it. If Common Core were as wonderful as everyone thinks it is, why would you need to bribe states to adopt it? Over a short amount of time, wouldn't we naturally gravitate to what works, without government coercion?

It also seems strange to me that there are no pilot implementations. Why not have a few districts try it, test it, revise it, and let the rest of us learn from them? Why is it that all these states had to implement within one or two years? The textbook publishers are scrambling to keep up. The assessments won't be done till 2014. Why must we all hurry and jump on this bandwagon? What is the harm in waiting and watching how it goes in other states and districts? Normally, a major change that incurs this level of expense should be discussed at the district-level, reviewed by the SCC's, tested in a few schools, and then rolled out. This massive expenditure was mandated without any real, public input in Utah. Upon inquiring who, locally, had been involved in the 'extensive parental and teacher input', I was told, if it had been a Utah-based initiative, we would have had more local involvement. Instead, many parents and educators throughout the nation had input. Glad to hear my responsibility for my child's education has been co-opted by 'other parents and educators, nationally'. No public hearings, no pilot programs, no textbooks, no assessments. But we do have Federal grants, Federal financial incentives, and Federal legislation.

A few weeks ago, I attended a class on "The Utah Core". The presenter from the State Office of Education told me, when I asked about data to support the Common Core, there wasn't any because it wasn't fully implemented anywhere. She did have anecdotal data from one teacher, however. If I proposed this kind of leap-before-you-look adventure in business, based solely on the "expert opinion" of others but no pilot program, no hard data, it wouldn't even be considered. For those of you interested in a good, but long, read (originally published by the American Association of School Administrators) on the lack of data, click here.

"Where is the evidence to support the rhetoric surrounding the CCSS? This is not data-driven decision making. This is a decision grasping for data.

The evidence offered by the NGA and CCSSO to make the case for a cause and effect relationship, or any significant relationship for that matter, between test result ranking, economics, and the need for national curriculum standards (and eventually national testing) amounts to nothing more than snake oil.

Yet this nation will base the future of its entire public education system, and its children, upon this lack of evidence."

Thomas Jefferson said, "The way to have good and safe government is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many, distributing to every one exactly the functions he is competent to perform best." (Letter to Joseph Cabell, 2/2/1816) Either we, as individual districts or states, after 230 years of local control, are incompetent to the education of our children or this is not the way to have good and safe government...for we are trusting it all to one.

Who Decides What Your Child Should Learn?

2012-01-22T19:00:00.002-07:00

Education is taking a radical turn from where it has been over the last century. In the name of better standards and increased rigor, the relationship parents have to their child's education will forever be obstructed and second-guessed. This was all done without your knowledge and your consent. It was done, in most cases, by well-intentioned people who believe they have the best interests of your child at heart. You need to know how Common Core changes your ability to influence your child's education, the overall educational establishment, and where you stand. If this change is, in your opinion, the best option at this point in time, then, having made an informed decision, I'd recommend sending thank you letters to those who decided on this course of action for you (the governor, the State Superintendent, the state board of education, Bill Gates, Arne Duncan, the NEA, etc.). If you disagree with what is happening, like me, then you need to take action. But either way, we, the people, need to be informed as to how Common Core came to be, the pros and cons, and what, if anything, should be done about it. We are at a crossroads in American education. Will posterity praise us for our foresight or curse us for our slumber?

Once upon a time, parents were in charge of their own child's education. They were involved in selecting the teacher and the curriculum. Even when public education first came on the scene in the mid-1800's, parents were still highly involved in what would be taught to their child. Thomas Jefferson, who advocated a very basic education (reading and some math) for all, said the schools should be managed by "the parents in each ward [district]", not a government entity. The reason for this management, said Jefferson, was "to have good and safe government...[by] not trust[ing] it all to one." The school board is supposed to be the 'local control', but how much input have you had on Common Core? How much input has your local school board had in deciding to adopt Common Core? The answer is none. It was handed down from the State Office, and we will be implementing it. The School Community Councils (SCC) will be selecting the math curriculum from a set of curricula designated by the district and the state. There is no current process for parents to influence the Language Arts component. You are not managing your child's education. Your community is not. Your teachers are not. Your local school board is not. And, now, having made this decision, the State School Board is not.

As a parent, the responsibility for educating your child, lies with you. How much control should you be willing to give away? And at what price?

Parental control of education is a principle that dates back to the first American colonists. In Utah County, we have a culture that values education but places parental responsibility for that education first and foremost. Common Core changes the fundamental relationship between the parent and their child's education. Under the Common Core standards, should you wish to change an aspect of the core, you must get the parents, not just of your school, your district, or even your state to band together to lobby for a change. You must get a majority of parents in 44+ states to put pressure on unelected individuals in a private organization to change those standards. You must also get the Federal Government to go along with it, since they are funding and legislating based on that core.

"The Common Core train is already on the track," you say. I have been asked if it is possible to change it. There are options from the local implementation all the way up to the state legislature. (Oklahoma adopted Common Core and there is a push in their state legislature to rescind it. Utah could do the same thing.) The most common question people ask is, "Isn't it too late to change it?" Is it ever too late to do the right thing?

I will publish a blog on each of the following items every day this week. However, here are the claims about Common Core and my rebuttal.

It's NOT a Federal Program...technically speaking!
Here is what Common Core (now renamed in our state "Utah State Core" due to "concerns" about the word "common") is and is not, according to proponents.

1. It is not a Federal program. I say, it is a national program. More than forty-four states is national. The tests are funded by the US Department of Education. The Federal Government can 'incentivize' adoption of the standards and assessments.

2. It was developed by the governors of the fifty states; it's really a grassroots, state initiative. The National Governor's Association provides the appearance of a state-led initiative. However, those fifty governors didn't create the standards. Big names and big money in the education establishment have been pushing for some type of national, not federal, standards for nearly twenty years. The governors' signing on just gave legitimacy to their efforts.

3. It does not determine assessment testing. The US Department of Ed is funding the assessments and "encouraging" states to adopt those assessments. One of the advantages promoted by Common Core advocates is the standardized testing that will result. We will be able to compare Utah against nearly every other state in the union.

4. It does not determine curriculum. I say it will. Assessments drive curriculum. Teachers will only be able to choose their curricula and other materials from among those things that have been shown to improve test scores, and hence, are approved for Common Core.

5. It is voluntary. If I make you an offer you can't refuse, is it voluntary?

6. The standards are more rigorous. It depends on what state you're in. In Utah, the math standards are rated the same (A-minus for both). Also, who or what defines rigorous?

7. It will not take away local control. If the control over the standards, the assessments, the funding, and (if we implement more merit pay) the teachers isn't removing local control, I don't know what is. We need to understand that every expansion of centralized education is done at the expense of local and parental control. How can it be otherwise?

So, you see a discrepancy. You may wonder how can I make the claims I do when the really smart people, with all the letters after their names pushing Common Core, claim the exact opposite. I'm glad you asked.

Stay tuned for a new blog on each of these subjects every day this week. If you read nothing else on my blog for the next three years, please read and understand this information on Common Core. Share it with everyone in your neighborhood, your church, your family, and pretty much anywhere else in the nation. Become informed and then take action, either in support of it, or against it. This is too important an issue for you to passively accept what others have decided on your behalf is in the best interests of YOUR child.

Claims: Board Meeting Jan. 10, 2012

2012-01-18T23:22:00.002-07:00

In this blog:
Claims and the 1/10/12 board meeting review
Mountain Ridge SCC: Math Meeting: Update: Math Meeting now tentatively scheduled for March 29
Board priorities from the 1/6/12 retreat: The direction we are going this year
Links to legislation on claims and an example of a claim.

Jan. 10, 2012 Board Meeting: Claims
There was no study session this week, and the board meeting was very short. The only non-standard issue was a concern I raised about how we approve claims.

Approval, to me, indicates I have thoroughly reviewed, understood, and agree with whatever the motion is. So, in the case of the claims, my voting to approve would indicate I have given my consent and agreement to every expenditure on your behalf. To read my post from last year on the claims, please go here. After that post and subsequent discussions with the superintedent, I have been abstaining from the claims vote.

For a district, the size of Alpine, thorough review of the claims is all but impossible. The claims for the previous month are placed on the website about three or four days prior to the business board meeting. There are roughly 400 pages containing about fifteen transactions per page. Even if there were enough information on each line item to indicate the exact purpose and description of each item, it would be daunting to go through all 6000 transactions in that amount of time.

Instead, the board has approved policies and procedures, specifying who can approve which purchases and for what amounts. See the manual here. We have internal and external auditors who verify these procedures are being followed, according to common auditing standards. So, unless something meets the threshhold of needing specific board approval, everything in the claims has already been budgeted, approved, and paid for under our current guidelines.

My fellow board members do not see a conflict in voting for approval. They have stated the guidelines are being followed. We hire good people, and we trust them to follow those procedures. I concur, all except for the approval part. If the motion were to approve our procedures every month, I could vote yes. If the motion were to trust our current administrators to follow those procedures, I could vote yes. But, the vote is to approve the expenditures. I cannot approve of something on your behalf without sufficient information for that approval.

This week, I informed our board president, I would be voting no on the claims from this point forward. I, then, requested we find a way of handling the claims to accurately reflect, not detailed, individual board approval, but rather the actual process of accepting the report of the business administrator or some system of placing the information into the public record. (If you are interested, I have listed the links to the applicable legislation below.) In short, I have not found a reason why the claims need formal approval. The board will address this issue in a study session. But in the meantime, I will vote no on the claims, and you will understand why.

Mountain Ridge SCC: Math Meeting
I attended the Mountain Ridge SCC where the Common Core Math process was discussed. The current plan is to hold a parent meeting on March 29 (orignally said: March 22, updated 1/19/12) at 7pm to discuss Common Core, the options for the math curriculum, as well as, to give the parents information on which curriculum the SCC is selecting/has selected. Most of the SCC members were intent on having textbooks for the curriculum, providing they were happy with one of the options selected by the district committee. Having textbooks is an important thing for many parents at MRJH. Also, the SCC created a PR committee for the purpose of getting the parents involved in this decision. If you have reports on math/Common Core information from other SCC's, I'd be happy to share them. I want to make sure this information gets out to as many parents as possible. It is a fast timeline, and we don't want people who are interested to not be involved.

Board Priorities
In my previous post, I outlined our procedure for defining the board priorities for the upcoming year. Here is the official, prioritized list from the Jan. 6, 2012 meeting, as rated by the board, the superintendent, and the business administrator.

Support the list of Superintendent and Cabinet Focus items for the next 6-12 months
Continue to recruit quality teachers and administrators and retain them. Mentor and train leadership
Filter out low-performing teachers and administrators
Address class-size issue (especially elementary and possibly subject)
Increase the use of technology in instruction
Have plan to reduce debt
Recognize "super stars"
Achieve Master Boards Award from the Utah School Boards Association
Find ways for the average person to become more aware of the role SCC's play in getting public feedback
Find alternative ways to involve parents in the actual education
Increase incentive pay
Find ways for the committees to be more effective
Allow the student body to directly elect the student body officers

Claims Example and Links to Legislation
Here's an example from Dec. 2011 claims:
AMS Products $440.32 Desc: WO 45309/AMS. It's billed to the General Fund, Materials and Supplies, District, Support Services.

1) The Business Administrator is required to present the claims information to the board each month.
2) The monthly budget report must be presented to the board by state law, as well. We also approve this each month. I'm not sure formal approval for it is necessary either.
3) Claims must be itemized.
4) Board may approve identified purchases within the budget. Anything else must be specifically approved by the board. This last item, after discussion with some legislators, seems to indicate the board may set a policy that all amounts in the budget over, say $10,000, must come to the board. Other than that, if it's within the budget, we give the administration authority to purchase whatever is necessary. Outside of the budget, requires specific board approval.

Happy 2012: Where Are We Going This Year?

2012-01-10T00:05:00.000-07:00

In this blog:
Math Committee for Common Core (Hint: School Community Councils)
Review of Board Training
Agenda for Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2012.

Math Committee for Common Core Curriculum
The district has established a math committee to review curriculum for the Common Core. We will be implementing grades 6 -8 (some 9) this Fall. Those currently in 9 - 12, will continue with the current standards throughout their high school careers. The rest of the grades will implement in 2013. There are members of the district community council (Bruce Armstrong, Kim Paulson, and Melanie Westcott, among others), teachers, and staff that will be on this committee. Sometime before April 15, when textbooks need to be ordered, the math committee will make several recommendations. Then, the School Community Councils (SCC's) will decide on the curriculum their school will use. There will be school community council meetings where this information will be presented to the parents and the community at large.

In short, you need to get involved with the district community council members on the district committee, as well as make sure your views are reflected in your local school's community council. If you have an opinion, this is the point you get to provide feedback, and it is done via the SCC's.

I would appreciate information about the school community council meetings in your school (dates/times, etc), and would be happy to post any and all information on this blog, as well as Facebook. This is being done at a local level, so you must be the one to attend school community council. All SCC's are public meetings and open to everyone. The SCC's, in theory, should print their meeting notices on the Utah Public Notice website.

Board Training
The board met for our semi-annual board retreat/training. We reviewed the board handbook and processes, and then set priorities for the coming year for the district staff. This may sound boring, but this is the meeting where the board provides formal, overall direction to the administration and staff.

Priorities
Every year, the board creates a list of Basket Items to give specific direction to the staff about our priorities for the district overall. Each board member takes a turn, lists a priority, and then it is discussed. After that, each board member, the superintendent, and the business administrator assign a priority to each item (1 -5, 5 being the highest priority). The top five or six priorities are those that will be worked on. The others will be done, if there are sufficient resources.

I suggested:

1) Put a plan in place to reduce our debt, so that when we bond next time, the bond amount will be less and our overall debt is less--not just reduced by the required amount of principal. Some options presented were:

Create a fund where money is saved for future building needs and/or to reduce debt by paying some debt off sooner
Limit the amount of bonding to maybe just a high school next time, or to a specific, lesser amount.
Instead of reducing some of the taxes that naturally go down as debt is paid off, go through a truth in taxation hearing every year to maintain the level of taxation to either pay off more of the debt or to fund additional buildings directly, instead of through debt.

2) Make sure we are emphasizing the role of the School Community Councils (SCC) as the "vehicle" through which the board requests feedback from the local community. The board currently receives feedback on everything from the bond, the math curriculum to the mission, visions, values and goals through School Community Council and PTA meetings. During the bond process, every school's SCC/PTA received a presentation about the bond. This was also one way for the public to indicate which projects they wanted to see included, to comment on the amount of the bond and the taxing implications, etc. The SCC's will be used this spring to decide on a math curriculum to accommodate the new Common Core standards and assessments that the State Board of Education has imposed on each school district in Utah. See the above section on the Math Committee.

3) Find ways to involve parents more in the actual education of their child. I believe we have a large, untapped and very beneficial resource in having parents involved, directly, in their child's education. This would require some thinking out of the box because we have been accustomed, for nearly 100 years, of sending our kids to school, and just making sure they do their homework. Being able to use technology to customize the education for each child would allow parents the opportunity to be more involved in seeing and experiencing what their child is learning. We know that parental involvement is the leading indicator of a child's academic success. Unfortunately, we justify leaving this aside because "some parents can't or won't be involved". As I've mentioned previously, there is no reason to penalize those families where the parents can be involved because some parents can't. Why not focus, instead, on what we can do in those situations where parents do want to be more involved. For myself, I'd be happy to mentor and oversee more of my children's work, alleviating that responsibility from the teachers, and freeing them up to accommodate more students or more involved learning/mentoring, etc.

One item that received quite a lot of discussion was reducing class sizes. Everyone is in favor of this. However, to reduce class size by a single student across the board would cost $3.2M in on-going expenses. Some teachers and parents prefer having aids to reduce the adult to student ratio, but leaving a larger class. Targeted reductions (e.g. K-3 grades) were also discussed. A proposed bill that will be going through the legislature will limit class sizes. ASD's impact would be $20M plus 10 new schools, to accommodate the new class size mandate, if passed. One of the options we are using is the extended day in elementary schools, where the teacher only has half the class in the morning for reading and the other half in the afternoon. That allows a smaller class size with limited resources, but targeted to the most important skills.

Another issue was incentive pay and recognizing "super stars" in our teachers. There are two schools of thought on the incentive pay. Currently, ASD rewards teacher teams (e.g. the 3rd grade at one school or the Math Dept. at another school) with incentive pay. Alpine Foundation rewards individual teachers, but, starting this year, will also recognize one outstanding teacher team. The concern about rewarding individuals for their work is it might limit teachers' desire to collaborate in our Professional Learning Communities (PLC's). So, the desire is to reward an effective team for their collaboration. The difficulty is by not rewarding (either monetarily or by some sort of recognition) truly outstanding performers, you are either ignoring those people or rewarding them along with those they are bringing along. In short, you are rewarding non-performers for being part of a high-performing team. The other concern brought up was who should decide. Logically, the principals would decide, but like any organization, administration has its favorites. It is an imperfect system. Still, I would favor rewarding individuals for high performance, and that high performance would also include collaborating with and mentoring their fellow teachers. I am uncomfortable with the idea of mandating a group reward, over individual recognition.

Here is the list of basket items (in the order they were suggested), and the first two--according to memory--are the ones that took top priority. I will post the actual priority when I receive it.

Continue to recruit quality teachers and administrators and retain them. Mentor and train in leadership.
Support the list of Superintendent and Cabinet focus areas for the next 6-12 months*
Address class size issue (especially elementary and possibly by subject)
Increase incentive pay
Have plan to reduce debt
Recognize "super stars"
Filter out low-performing teachers and administrators
Achieve Master Boards Award (new award presented by the Utah School Boards Association)
Allow the student body to elect the student body officers
Increase the use of technology instruction
Find ways for the average person to become more aware of the role SCC's play in getting public feedback
Find ways for the committees to be more effective
Find alternative ways to involve parents in the actual education

* Superintendent and Cabinet Focus Areas for Jan - July/Dec. 2012 (Italicized indicate the Areas of Focus)
1. Gifted and Talented program shift -- Question four (what we do if they already know it), ALL classes, Gifted classes (Student Achievement)
2. Language Immersion classes-Expansion (Chinese and Portuguese) (Comprehensive Curriculum)
3. Utah Core (Common Core) training and implementation for Math and Language Arts. (Hold community meetings at the school level this spring to educate parents and patrons.) Train principals to engage the public in Utah Core implementation. (Teacher Quality)
4. Math committee at district level to review materials and recommend list for school selection. {Community Relations and Resources)
5. Training of Collaboration Team Leaders (CTL's) to continue support of PLC process with a focus on the four essential questions to improve Student Learning. (Leadership, Quality Teaching, & Student Achievement)
6. Refocus of East Shore High School. (Comp. Curriculum and Student Achievement)
7. Expansion of online school and options (K-12). (Comprehensive Curriculum)
8. Extended year school (credit recovery at local high school during the year and at East Shore during the summer). (Student Achievement)
9. Evaluate program effectiveness -Using Hanover Research and BYU/Partnership to evaluate (double dosing, PLC's, summer collaboration, effective instructional techniques, etc.) (Teacher Quality)
10. Transition of AS400 System to new financial program - Review and focus technology to support student learning. Unlock more features of Skyward. (Resources and Student Achievement)
11. Administrative appoints for July of 2012 (New Junior High, Diversity Specialist, Online School) (Leadership)
12. Facilities plan for expansion of Dream School, Summit, ATEC, Food Services, Media, Bus Garage, Technology and Maintenance. (Resources)
13. Bond implementation and purchase of additional land for schools - Plans for new high school design. (Resources and Community Relations)
14. Review the location formula for the distribution of ASD resources - new schools vs. Title 1 schools vs. schools in the middle. (Resources)
15. Keep Employee Morale High / Negotiation Process. (School and District Culture)

Board Handbook and Processes
The board has a handbook, outlining our processes and responsibilities. Included in this is our Code of Conduct. I have updated the Code of Conduct page on this blog to reflect the changes that were made at last year's meeting. No changes were made this year.

Some discussion took place on our collaborative governance model. I asked for clarification on what other governance models there were and how they would differ from our current one. The main difference was board members are invited to be on committees that the administration would have with or without our involvement, e.g. curriculum, technology, PR. In the past, decisions were made that the board was unaware of (including Investigations Math). This governance model allows for more involvement between the board and the administration than a traditional model. The only difficulty I have with it, is the lines are sometimes too blurred. It can be difficult to know when we are being provided information, just so we know, and when the information will come back later, like in the budget, for formal approval. If there is not sufficient discussion because we don't want to micromanage, it may be assumed we are in agreement. One of the board members said that over time these things would become clear to those of us who are still new.

Another discussion involved the committees. (See above for our role in the committees.) The board members report on their committee meetings during the formal board meeting. However, some have felt the committees aren't very effective. Also, sometimes, the board presentation is almost the same as that made in the committee meeting. In the interest of streamlining and to provide information to all board members, we will be receiving agendas for these committees in advance. This will allow other board members to convey their thoughts to committee members prior to the discussion. The committees are for the staff and the board to vet ideas before being presented to the full board for discussion and possible implementation.

We also discussed some tweaking on the superintendent and business administrator evaluations process. The Board Handbook says in March the board selects an evaluation instrument. Then, in April, that tool is used to evaluate the Superintendent. My emphasis was on selecting the evaluation instrument at the time the superintendent or the business administrator is appointed, and that tool should be in effect, unless formally modified by both parties, until the subsequent evaluation (two years later). I was told the instrument had, in fact, been selected, and the four new board members would be provided with this information.

Jan. 10, 2012 Board Meeting Agenda
There will not be a study session prior to the regular board meeting.

BOARD MEETING:
575 NORTH 100 EAST
AMERICAN FORK

6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE

RECOGNITIONS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS FOR DECEMBER
ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report

2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report

4. Student Releases - JB, CC, EH, BH, AH

SH, AI, AJ, MK, JL, EL, IM, NM, SP

KP, CS, CT, JV, AV

5. Student Expulsion - JH

REPORT

1. Membership Report

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Bond, Emergency Procedures and More: Nov/Dec 2011 Board Meetings

2011-12-23T16:41:00.001-07:00

Alpine School District is Officially the largest school district in Utah
The State Office of Education has received all the Oct. 1 enrollment data across the state. ASD is now the largest school district in the state. There are just under 1400 public school districts in the US. The average size is somewhere between 2500 and 5000 students. Last Spring, Alpine was around 64th in size in the nation.

Nov 3/9: Common Core Meetings:
I will do a separate post on this topic. (Otherwise, this blog would be soooo long, you could use it to cure insomnia.) I do want to thank all those who attended both meetings. The Nov. 3 meeting had more than 30 attendees. I have heard, now other schools are requesting a similar presentation. Additionally, there will be a math committee. I have no details on it, yet. However, stay tuned. I will let you know how to be involved in that discussion.

Nov 8 Board Meeting:
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Alpine School District: The CAFR
We discussed accept the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). This report is created by the Superintendent and the Business Administrator and is an annual accounting and summary of the fiscal state of the school district. It is reviewed by the district's external auditors, and they found no inconsistencies between their audits and the assertions made in the report. I was amazed by the detail and information available in that report. When you hear comments about how much is spent per child ($5145, p. 109) or how much teachers make (p.119), all that information is available in the CAFR report on the district website. Most of the really interesting stuff is listed toward the end of the report. We also have how much ASD spends on instruction (71%) vs administration (p.108), property tax amounts for the past 10 years (p.96). By the way, ASD has the lowest administrative costs, per capita, in the state, and the highest instructional--teacher/books--expenses in the state, as per the Utah Taxpayers Association. So, we spend more on teachers, and less on administration. I'm good with that.

New Directions: Alternative School, et. al.
Some new alternative education ideas that would lead to higher graduation rates were discussed. Some of these are as follows.
1. Online Classes
2.Credit Recovery: additional help for students who need to make up credits in order to graduate
3. Extended Year High School (Summer): Some of the high schools are open during the summer for students who need to catch up and for those who want to accelerate.
4. Summer Packets: Packets of work for classes that student can use to make up additional credits
5. Alternative School: Students who are Juniors and Seniors in High School and who are not in a position to graduate may transfer to East Shore High School. Currently, most coursework is done via packets and some online courses. The students have to come to East Shore to take tests and do any labs associated with their coursework. Students who graduate from East Shore (or this new proposed alternative option) will only need 24 credit hours, the state graduation minimum. ASD requires 28 of our other high schools. Some of our administrators have visited other alternative high schools in the state. They found higher graduation rates from some of these programs that require much stricter attendance, but they had greater "attachment" to the school. It is proposed that we follow these other districts in creating stricter attendance for an alternative high school.

Additional programs discussed were:
1. More language immersion in the north and west areas (Chinese and Portuguese)
2. Gifted and Talented magnet classes: If a student scored in at least the 93rd percentile on the standardized tests (used for this purpose), they would be invited to attend a magnet school where more challenging work would be provided to accommodate them. This would be in addition to the ALL classes.

There would be additional expense for these programs. We will have a price tag that is firm by January, but the numbers being bounced around are in the range of $500,000 to start up these programs.

Nov. 22 Board Meeting:
The Bond Results
• Total number of votes cast: 31,340

• Total number of affirmative votes: 17,934

• Total number of negative votes: 13,406

• Total number of challenged voters: 111

• Total number of challenged voters issued provisional ballots: 111

• Total number of provisional ballots issued: 642

• Total number of provisional ballots counted: 486

New Policies
Also discussed were head-injury and service animal policies. These policies were later approved at the Dec. 13 meeting.

Dec. 13 Board Meeting:
Emergency Preparedness
During the work session, we heard about the district's plan for emergencies, including school closings in case of snow or what-have-you. Each school must review their emergency plans annually, and train their staff. The district provides guidelines on this, but the schools are able to customize their plans as they see fit. Additionally, district personnel are involved in meetings with other emergency responders throughout the cities. For example, Highland/Alpine/Cedar Hills police and fire meet with ASD personnel once/month to discuss emergency needs and plans. These meetings, incidentally, are not open to the public, since they may deal with security and emergency situations.

Alternative Education Plans
Also, we were told that the alternative education plans, immersion and gifted and talented programs presented in the past (see Nov. 8 meeting above) were going forward. If the board had any concerns we should let them know, but things were headed in that direction.

During the board meeting, recognitions were made for the Friends of Alpine directors and the coaches who won championships this Fall.

Business Administrator
The most significant item of business was reappointing Rob Smith as the district's Business Administrator. Our district appoints the Business Administrator 6 months prior to the Superintendent, so that we aren't losing one or the other at the same time. Any salary adjustments, if approved, would not be decided or take effect until the next fiscal year. These would also be part of the 2012-13 budget process. From where I sit, the good financial state our district is in is a direct result of the oversight and fiscal planning of Mr. Smith. As Board Member Mark Clement stated, "Many people don't know that one of the greatest taxpayer advocates we have is Rob Smith." Rob often says to us, "We can do virtually anything you want, we just can't do everything you want."

Governor's Budget
Board Member JoDee Sundberg is involved in the Governor's Education Commission. She briefly reviewed the Governor's proposed budget as it relates to education. The Governor's top education priority is to fund growth. However, Mrs. Sundberg said the $40M (roughly) proposed to fund growth in the state doesn't include some aspects of property tax equalization that will negatively impact growing districts like Alpine. I don't quite understand it yet, but I will get you more information. I'm told it's between $23 and $40M short of fully funding growth in education for this next year.

I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Annual Financial Audit: Board Meeting Nov. 8, 2011 Agenda

2011-11-06T23:49:00.002-07:00

Two items of note for the board meeting on Tuesday: 1) CAFR report--annual audit/financial report and 2) school closings. Also, don't forget to vote on Tuesday whether you are for or against the bond.

Award-Winning CAFR (Finanical Report)
Don't tune out yet, just because it has to do with finances. Every year, the district is required to have an independent audit. The auditors found no concerns with the books or our compliance with Federal and State requirements for certain monies that come with strings and hoops. Evidently, we are very good at jumping as high as necessary. An interesting point was emphasized (which I've heard from other auditor-types). That is the audit takes the policies of the district and uses them to make sure the proper procedures are being followed. For example, if the district's policy is to have a principal sign off on a purchase for a $7000 video camera, the audit will make sure that the video camera does exist, was properly signed for and receipted, and placed on the books accurately, for example, as instructional use equipement. What an audit doesn't do is decide whether or not the item should have been purchased in the first place.

The CAFR (Comprehensive Annual Financial Report) report is 120+ pages long and is quite involved for those without an auditing background. It is the required annual report that documents all the finances for the district from July 1, 2010 - June 30, 2011. I have some background with accounting and finance, having had to deal with these in my business. However, I received the report last Tuesday, and have successfully gone through only half of it so far. I would GREATLY appreciate any and all accountant/auditor types who are interested in giving me some pointers on what items to focus on. You can find the report here. ASD's CAFR report has won awards for 28+ years.

School Boundary Restrictions 2012-13 School Year
Another item on the agenda has to do with restricting some schools to out-of-area students. The board can decide to restrict schools to just a specific geographic area. In Utah, most schools are 'open', meaning that if you want to drive your kid there and register them, they can attend. Each local school board has the option of restricting enrollment at a given school for a few specific reasons.

The most common reason is enrollment. For example, Lone Peak's enrollment is at 2171. The suggestion to close the school is a result of not having enough teachers, rooms, etc for additional students. In this instance, those who were granted exceptions, e.g. North of Canyon Road in Cedar Hills, will need to apply for an out-of-area exception by March, 2012 (I think). The next most common reason has to do with program protection. As I understand it, the concern is if a School A is open, those in a neighboring School B may come to School A, leaving School B without enough students for certain programs. This is the case with Lakeridge Jr. High and Orem Jr. High. I would welcome your feedback on these issues, especially from those in the affected areas. For a list of proposed schools, please go here. All other schools in the district (not on the closed list) are open, and you can go there and register, if you so choose.

Board Meeting Agenda
STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to review the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR), and to receive an update regarding the focus and direction of language immersion and gifted programs, East Shore High School and alternative education programs.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE

RECOGNITIONS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS FOR OCTOBER
ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report
2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report

4. Student Releases - KB, MC, MGC, CD, KD

JMD, JD, JLD, ED, BE, EG, KH, CJ, DJ, KK

NL, RO, JR, TS, JS, RT, VV, MW, BW

5. Student Expulsions - DB, AB, CF
6. Career and Technical Education (CTE) National Competition

ACTION ITEMS
1. Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) and External Audit

2. Schools Closed to Out-of-area Attendance for the 2012-2013 School Year

3. Board Meeting Schedule for 2012

DISCUSSION ITEMS

1. Policy No. 5550 – Head Injuries
2. Policy No. 5320 – Service Animals

REPORT

1. Membership Report

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Oct. 25 Board Meeting Agenda

2011-10-24T23:35:00.000-06:00

The board will have the second work session each month dedicated to board training ("How to be a better board member") and a discussion of various topics. The last discussion item was math and was met with concern from The Daily Herald. See here. Because of this, we will not be having just open discussions on any items board members wish to discuss. Instead, we will receive a presentation of information on a particular topic and then discuss that topic.

The topic for the 25th concerns "The Four Essential Questions". In the district, teachers are given four essential questions to use in determining their direction with their students. Those questions are:
1. What do we want student to know?
2. How will we know that they know it?
3. What do we do if they don't know it?
4. What do we do if they already know it?
Some board members are particularly interested in the fourth question. There are a lot of incentives, both state and federal, that address question 3, but we want to make sure there are options and challeges for kids who already "get it".

Here is the agenda for the meeting.

AGENDA . . . TUESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2011

HILLCREST ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

651 EAST 1400 SOUTH

OREM

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

A study session will be held prior to the regular board meeting. The purpose of the study session

will be for (1) professional development for the Board, and (2) to discuss the “four essential

questions” focused on student learning.

BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE

STUDENT RECOGNITIONS

ALPINE FOUNDATION RECOGNITIONS

PRINCIPAL, PTA AND SCHOOL

COMMUNITY COUNCIL REPORTS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

ACTION ITEM

1. Utah Consolidated Application
BOARD MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS
CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Oct. 11, 2011 Board Meeting Agenda

2011-10-09T20:53:00.000-06:00

Oct. 11, 2001 Board Meeting
District Office: 575 N. 100 E., American Fork, UT 84003

To see the supporting documentation, please go here.

STUDY SESSION
4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to (1) discuss the future focus and direction of East Shore High School, (2) to review the bond brochure to be mailed to the public, and (3) to discuss other current issues for future meetings.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING
6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE

RECOGNITIONS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS FOR SEPTEMBER
ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report
2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report

4. Student Releases – MB, MB, CD, MD, AH, FJ, ML, TM, JM, BM, AR, SS, AT, JW, KW

5. Student Expulsion – HT

6. School Clubs

ACTION ITEM

1. Student Travel Requests
DISCUSSION ITEMS

1. Utah Consolidated Application
2. Schools Closed to Out-of-area Attendance for the 2012-2013 School Year

3. Board Meeting Schedule for 2012

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Math, Math, and More Math: Board Meeting 9/27/2011

2011-10-02T13:49:00.000-06:00

Work Session
Note: The Board Training took place prior to the math discussion. I am putting the report of the math discussion first, as that is the main topic of interest.

Math
Board Member Mark Clement was interested in discussing math in the district, especially in light of the new Common Core Curriculum starting in 2012. You can read the Daily Herald's report on it here.

For those of you new to this discussion, in about 2000, ASD implemented Investigations Math, a constructivist philosophy. The emphasis is on children discovering math concepts for themselves without an emphasis on standard algorithms and memorization of math facts like Traditional Math (or instructivist) methods (e.g. Saxon, Singapore).

Many parents, like me, were upset with this approach. Most of the concern was their kids didn't know basic math facts. Also, when parents tried to help with homework, the parents weren't able to either 1) understand the homework or 2) the standard algorithms (that parents learned as kids) were not acceptable. This situation created a disconnect between parent and child, where the parent is portrayed (whether intentionally or not) to be inferior to the teacher. And while we want our children to respect and learn from their teachers, it is never acceptable to use education to create a wedge between parent and child. Additionally, some parents were instructed not to help their kids with math homework because "they'd just mess it up." So, we created a situation for parents to be less involved with their kids' education. Understandably, this didn't go over well with many parents.

The district implemented Investigations Math because the Utah State Office of Education (USOE) was planning to encourage all schools in the state to use this program. ASD had some funding available and made the switch a year or so early. However, due to the large amount of parental backlash, the USOE never did request other districts to make the switch.

After 6 or 7 years, ASD revisited math, and suggested four math programs for each elementary school to decide between. (Investigations was put on a 'secondary curriculum' list by the USOE, so it couldn't be used without another curriculum to supplement.) Most schools decided on Scott-Foresman, three stayed with Investigations (needing to supplement in some fashion), and one picked something else. The secondary schools used Connected Math and Interactive Math, as part of the Investigations implementation. The secondary schools were not focused on during the 2007 change in math curriculum. However, the district did adopt a Balanced Math Approach that would allow teachers to use a mix of traditional and constructivist curricula.

The first thing we found out was, since the secondary schools set their own budgets, they decide which curricula they will be implementing. The district doesn't know which curricula they are using--"Everything from soup to nuts." The elementary schools do get their math purchases through the district, so that is why we know which schools are using which textbooks. The Scott-Foresman texts come (from the publisher) with a little insert on using Investigations. Board Member Paula Hill suggested a survey on what programs the schools are using to facilitate a more informed discussion.

My points are as follows.

1. Whenever I have been in meetings, it is stated or implied that Traditional Math is simply rote memorization and that there is no deeper understanding taught of math concepts. In using Saxon and Singapore Math with my own kids, I have not found this to be the case. Both have done a fine job explaining, through concrete examples and manipulatives, why, for example, you carry or borrow when adding or subtracting numbers. An employee of the USOE, Brenda Hales, told Mr. Clement that when implementing the Common Core Standards, there will be more of a concrete emphasis in the lower grades, but more "critical thinking" in the upper grades. Again, we see the prejudice against traditional math: Traditional equals rote memorization without understanding; Constructivist equals critical thinking and greater understanding.

My personal experience, as a mathematician, is that without the foundation of mathematical relationships between numbers (2 x 3 = 6), the brain is unable to grasp higher-level concepts because it's bogged down on something that should be automatic. This is comparable to playing the piano, where your fingers literally memorize the note combinations, so when you go to play, compose, or improvise, your brain (and your ear) are able to concentrate on the creative aspects, and not on the mundane. So, when we say, "Balanced Math Approach", we are implying that a traditional approach is insufficient and must be combined with a constructivist approach. I would disagree with this. As far as I have been able to find, there is no independent, third-party research to back up the constructivist Investigations approach to math. (The one study, cited in favor of Investigations, was funded by interested parties.) In contrast, Saxon provides standardized test scores of before and after Saxon implementation. And Singapore (the country, which developed and continues to use Singapore Math) consistently scores at the top of the international TIMSS test.

2. It was stated that we want to give teachers the flexibility to use whatever methods they are comfortable with, and that not all children respond to the same methods. However, if we want to allow teachers that flexibility, then we need to allow parents the flexibility to select the teachers that match their preferences for what they know is best for their own child.

3. It is important for parents to have more specific information about the main textbooks/curricula their kid's teacher is using. I would like to see this information readily available to parents. Getting information to parents should always be paramount. Board Member Paula Hill repeatedly took a stand for 'information rich', giving as much background as possible to all stakeholders. Her stand was that as we educate parents, we involve them more and more in the process. However, this wasn't something the board, as a whole, supported.

4. The Colleges of Education seem to be teaching more constructivist approaches to math. Even when I took math education courses in the late eighties, the math ed courses were constructivist and the ones I took for my degree were traditional. I didn't know the names or that there were even different 'types' of math, but I do remember a different approach in the math ed courses. Given that approach hasn't lessened in the last 20+ years, our teachers are being shown the advantages of constructivism. Board Member Paula Hill said we should be giving our teachers the upside to the traditional approach, as well. (In our district, 35% of our teachers have five or less years of experience.) When Investigations was introduced, the veteran teachers were the ones who, by and large, refused to use it. There needs to be some sort of 'equal time' for the traditional approach. It is hard to decided between two things, when only one choice is presented and is shown to be the best option. Without actual experience with different methods, why wouldn't you choose the one you were familiar with?

5. UVU has a math remediation rate of 64 -72% over the last 5 years for first-time college students. (2005: 64%, 2006: 72%, 2007: 70%, 2008: 69%, 2009: 68%, 2010: 69%, UVU Institutional Research & Information, Aug 2011) I was told ASD had met with UVU administrators a while ago. UVU was not concerned with the preparation of ASD students. UVU said a lot of this remediation stems from missionaries who have taken a few years "off" before going to college. Still, it seems like a high number. I would like to see a greater emphasis on traditional math. I suspect a stronger ASD approach to math would reduce the need for UVU to remediate our former students.

6. Mr. Clement suggested we get parents involved in discussing math (via public meetings) prior to implementation of the Common Core. Dr. Barry Graff (head of district curriculum) said it would be difficult because there are no textbooks currently developed for Common Core math. The publishers are "cutting and pasting" from their existing texts to accommodate the Common Core. As we implement it next year, our teachers will have to 'get by'. However, Mr. Clement suggested that now is probably the best time for parental input since nothing is set in stone. I am in full agreement and will encourage meetings with all of you for your input on math and the Common Core. Waiting until "down the road" will only put texbook authors in a position of driving the curriculum. Veteran teachers may be able to cobble together a variety of approaches based on their experience, but the 35% of our teachers who are new will probably rely heavily on the textbook.

Additionally, there was a concern that the math terminology has become quite charged. Most board members would like to use less emotional words, and not have teachers label what they are doing as traditional or investigations. However, these are the words parents know. Giving parents a choice would be a great first step. For myself, I don't care what method a teacher uses or that another parent likes a method I don't care for, as long as I can make that choice for my kids. I hope with this discussion, things will move more toward that end.

I'm sure this will not be the last math discussion we have as a board. I am grateful we were able to have an open discussion about a topic of such interest in our district. The board seemed to agree on a specific direction. The principals need to be more flexible with parents making requests based on 'Investigations vs Traditional Math'. The idea of putting a teacher's math philosophy "out there" for all to see wasn't supported. So, for the majority of parents who 'trust the system', there needs to be a vehicle to help them see the choices they could be making. We can actually draw more parents into the discussion as we educate them on what options are available.

This discussion is not just for educators, it is for all of our stakeholders. Right now, as a parent, you have to dig the information out for yourself. If you do have a preference and want to have your child in a specific math program, you will need to meet with the principal and specifically request this. We were told that this is something that has rarely happened, but Mrs. Hill said, if parents didn't have the information, it isn't surprising they didn't make requests in this manner. It is assumed that not many people will care about which curriculum is being used, and there won't be so many requests that going to the principals will become burdensome.

I'm not sure I agree. I, personally, would have felt uncomfortable going directly to a principal about something like this. I would have assumed if it were an option, there would be an easier way of handling it. However, this is the procedure the board has suggested. So, if you have a preference, you may now contact your principal and ask to have your child in the math approach of your choice.

Note: One recommendation from a reader was to create two tracks: constructivist vs traditional.  Parents could choose which track they wanted their kids on, and then the teachers would be able to find consistency in approach from one grade to the next.

I welcome all your comments. I know this has been a hot topic, and is one I am very interested in. What approaches or recommendations do you have?

Board Training
Once a month, the board members will trade off and present an in-service training message from one of our board publications, e.g. American School Board Journal (published by the NSBA), etc. John Burton conducted this month's training. The topic was "Tell Your Story", something Board Member JoDee Sundberg has been working on for quite some time. Some of the highlighted concepts are as follows.

"Every school board, and every school board member, has a story to tell--and it's a story this country desperately needs. Right now, the very concept of public schools that are free and open to all is under attack--and the wrong side is winning the debate."
"We need to take more pride in our accomplishments and more care in how we conduct the public's business. Rhetoric matters. School board members need to choose their words carefully. Take time to craft memorable sound bites and analogies for complex issues and topics."

"Find a way to salt meetings, public forums...and elevator rides with your key messages. Stay on top of district news and take every opportunity to share just those nuggets that illustrate how well public schools are doing, or why we need their help to make sure all students succeed."
Some positive things mentioned about the district were:
1. Collaboration (Early-Out) Monday--First in the state to use structured time for collaboration.

2.Collaboration Incentive--Teachers use a rubric to improve their collaboration effectiveness. This is TEAM merit pay and includes a parent evaluation of the team.

3. Extended Year High Schools--Two High Schools sponsor two block terms in June and July for credit recovery and acceleration. Hundreds of students are attending this program. It is the only one like it in the state.

4. Alpine has the lowest administrative costs in the state of Utah, and Utah had the lowest in the nation.

5. Leadership Development with BYU--ASD developed a master's degree in conjunction with BYU that takes Alpine people interested in administration with a two-year comprehensive master's degree.

6. STARS Summer Reading--Alpine Foundation generates $80,000 annually to put STARS summer reading in the 10 schools with the highest number of first grade students reading below grade level. Gains of 4 months are average.

7. K-12 Online School--Over 400 home school students are registered and use an online curriculum provided by the district. ASD provides computers and two teachers to consult with home school parents.

8. What Counts--Over 2,000 people throughout the district participated in providing input on what they value about public schools and what Alpine can do to improve. (Areas of Focus)

9. District Community Council (DCC)--ASD was the first district in the state to organize a DCC. The council meets regularly with the superintendent and board members to provide feedback from the schools and community.

10. MORALE--In spite of budget challenges, morale among teachers and administrators is exceptionally high. There is a belief that the district is going in a very positive direction and there is great confidence in the leadership of the district.

Board Meeting
The Board Meeting was held at Barratt Elementary. The school choir performed, and students, parents, teachers, and staff were recognized. The board approved a revised resolution for poll watchers for the upcoming Bond Election. Please make sure to attend one of the meetings on the bond and bring 2 neighbors with you. For a list of dates and times, please go here.  When the board meeting adjourned, we actually saw daylight. ;-)

Math, Redistricting, President's Address

2011-09-26T17:12:00.001-06:00

Math Discussion

Tuesday's (Sept. 27) Board Meeting will be held at Barratt Elementary. During the Work Session at 4pm, the board will have an open discussion. Some board members (myself, included) have requested that we discuss math. So, this will probably be the topic for most of the Work Session. Community Comments are always welcome during the regular board meeting at 6pm. If you have any thoughts on this subject, please let me know.

Redistricting

Most of the board members met with the County Commissioners about redistricting. We were given a couple of draft plans, and the one that was supported, so far, has Lehi with its own board member. The other option had Lehi split into thirds and was rejected by the Superintendent almost immediately. The County will wait until the Legislature has officially finished its redistricting to finalize anything. They will also obtain input from the District Community Council, as well as representatives appointed by each city within ASD. Once the maps have been vetted, there will be a public hearing.

You may use the State's online redistricting tool to draw your own map of ASD. It isn't apparent, but you can monkey with it and get it to work. Here's how.

1. Go to the State's website, here. If you don't have a login, create one, and sign in.
2. Select a Blank State School Board template.
3. Click Create at the top of the page to get to the map.
4. On the left-hand side of the screen, there is an arrow about 1/3 of the way down. Click on that to open up additional options.
5. Expand Utah_ReferenceLayers, then Census 2010, then select the check-box by 41 Utah School Districts. (You may also want to check 'municipalities', which shows the population of each city.)
6. Click the arrow again to hide the reference layers. You may now use the zoom feature to zoom in on the state and find ASD.
7. With 284,505 people in ASD to be divided among 7 board members, you are trying to create districts of 40,643 people, roughly. They have to be contiguous, and the County is going to try to not split precincts.
8. Select the District 1 options from the pop-up box, select (in the first pane showing Active Area: District 1) to draw by area, square, polygon, and then start drawing/clicking. You can draw to fill in by squares, voting precincts, etc. (You may want to play with this to see how it works.)
9. If you accidentally go outside ASD's area, you will need to select 'unassigned' as the district and click to unassign those areas.

If you come up with a great map, please share it with me.

President Obama's Back to School Address to Students

On Wednesday, Sept. 28 at 11:30 am, President Obama will be giving his third annual address to school students. Alpine School District's policy allows each individual school and teacher to decide whether to show all or part of the address during school hours. It is supposed to be part of a meaningful curriculum, and the teachers/schools are to make sure the decision to watch all or part of the speech is communicated to parents. In the past, schools and/or teachers have recorded the address, and shown it later.

Sept. 27 Board Meeting Agenda

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2011

BARRATT ELEMENTARY SCHOOL
168 NORTH 900 EAST
AMERICAN FORK

STUDY SESSION
4:00 P.M.
A study session will be held prior to the regular board meeting. The purpose of the study session will be for (1) professional development for the Board and (2) to discuss current issues.

BOARD MEETING
6:00 P.M.
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE John Burton, Board Vice President

REVERENCE

SCHOOL CHORUS

STUDENT RECOGNITIONS

ALPINE FOUNDATION RECOGNITIONS

PRINCIPAL, PTA AND SCHOOL

COMMUNITY COUNCIL REPORTS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS*

ACTION ITEM
1. Resolution Approving the Polling Locations for the Bond Election

BOARD MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS
CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

*Time set aside for community comments is not a time to discuss specific personnel issues. Personnel issues are not appropriate discussion items for an open-meeting environment. If you have a personnel concern, we ask that you contact a member of the administration or put your concern in writing and address it to the Board of Education.

The Campaign in Favor of the Bond

2011-09-06T22:50:00.002-06:00

Important Note: Public Hearing on the Bond. Tuesday, Sept. 13, @ 6pm at the district office.

70% of your friends and neighbors believe that going into debt, via the bond, is a good idea. I don't.

"But you voted for the bond!"

I voted to give you the opportunity to debate this issue and to give our school district a clear mandate: do we continue with the debt cycle, or do we make difficult choices but prevent further debt? I am one of seven on the board. The rest of the board members are clearly in support of the bond. Some have a desire for a concrete plan to get out of debt. Some have a desire to get out of debt as soon as circumstance allows us to do so. With 70% of the people in favor of the bond, it doesn't make sense for the board, politically, to want to go a different direction. Without a clear mandate from you, via an election, the debt cycle will continue.

Whether you favor the bond, unequivocally, favor with a firm debt-reduction plan, or want a complete divestiture of debt, you need to speak up. You need to talk to your neighbors and come to one of the roughly 192 meetings planned in the next 2 months (see below for some dates and times).

If you are opposed to the bond and you don't speak up, you need to understand that 70% of the people in this area will out-vote you. If you support the bond, you are equally obligated to speak up and not let others carry your water. What if the non-bond people win?

One of the more frequent comments I hear is, "What are the options without the bond?" In short, there is a Plan B, but it hasn't really been talked about. The bond is the familiar, easy, and preferred option. This is "business as usual" for school districts (not just Alpine, by the way). The board is promoting it because they don't think you are willing to do the hard things, the principled things to get out of debt. And, according to the Bond Survey, they are correct.

The Bond Survey mentioned options like satellites, double sessions, reduction in programs, etc. What it didn't mention is a slew of creative ideas that people in the community have mentioned and could come up with to deal with some of these issues. Also, the survey didn't say that some bonding could be done without a tax increase. If the total bond amounts were phased down every time, that would be a great start in reducing debt at the outset. And honestly, without meaning to discredit myself or my fellow board members, the seven of us are not as creative and innovative as all of you.

I, personally, would like to see more parental involvement...and about 51% of the people in my area seemed to agree (based on the last election results). One of the options would be to have more work at home and online as opposed to 'at school', reducing the hours sitting in class. This allows parents greater involvement with their kids' education, and reduces the 'at school' time. But what about those kids whose parents can't or won't do this? We seem to worry about those who can't, but what about those that can? Let's assume that 10% , 25% or even 50% of our parents were willing and able to be involved to that degree, and then we provided for the others who are not able to. That would increase our capacity in all of our schools by that amount. For those who can't or won't, we are Utahns. We'll make sure everyone is taken care of.

In Utah County, we emphasize families and the parent-child relationship. We don't, truly, want our children raised by the state. We want the public educated, and we have decided to band together to accomplish that goal. However, in doing so, are we really willing to say, as parents, we want a very limited role in our kids' education? I know, in many cases, we have grown accustomed to it. But in the ideal, don't we want an increased role in our kids' lives, including their education?

A specific application of using double sessions would be to reduce the amount of hours to 4 and use the teachers as mentors. With 4 hour days, you might need 2 hours of parent/homework time to make up the difference. Alternatively, you use parent-time in preparation for the class the next day.

If an elementary teacher were to teach two 4-hours sessions/day, we then increase the total number of students taught by the teacher, increase the amount of money available to pay the teacher, and reduce the class sizes for that teacher. For example, if a third-grade class currently has 30 kids in it, what if we had two sessions of 15 students? The teacher would teach the same class, so (s)he would prep once, teach twice.

I'm not saying this is how it has to be. I'm just illustrating some of the options. If the board decided to implement these changes without a clear mandate from the people, I'm afraid we'd see an Investigations Math-like mutiny. But WITH the support of the people, we would see amazing things, including the most important element of all...parents helping their kids take control of their own education. And teachers would be freed up to do what they do best--teach, with parental support.

So what do you do now?

First, an official Public Hearing on the bond will take place Tues, Sep. 13, @ 6:00 pm at the District Office (575 N. 100 E. AF). No matter where you stand, please come and bring 2 friends with you to comment. It is assumed that either there won't be anyone who will come, or else the same people who commented last meeting will be there to repeat their concerns. Ask your friends and neighbors what they would want to do with $210M, and invite them to come to the meeting.

Second, the board will be voting to change the board meeting from Nov. 29 to Nov. 22. We are required, by law, to canvass the bond election results within 2 weeks of the election. This new date is the Tuesday prior to Thanksgiving. Since all board meetings are open, public meetings, you would be invited to attend this meeting as well.

Finally, the district must publish and send an informational notice to all patrons about the logistics of the bond: how much? what will it be used for? what's the need? how will it impact me? This notice is to be "the facts, Ma'am. Just the facts."

You also need to be aware of the following.

Friends of Alpine Organization
Friends of Alpine is a 501(c)3 organization that has been set up to accept donations to publicize and encourage the bond effort. In the past, district-affiliated non-profits like the Alpine Foundation were able to accept monies to promote the bond. The legislature changed that recently, and so a separate organization must be used. A few members of the Board of Education are on the Board of Friends of Alpine. There are also parents, and other interested people. Friends of Alpine can seek donations and run whatever marketing and advertising, including signs, it would like to promote adoption of the bond.

Employee and PTA/SCC Meetings
Between September 14 and the November election, there will be 192 meetings conducted by administrative staff. Some of these meetings will be for employees only. But, the rest are for the PTA/SCC organizations at each of the 79 schools in the district. This is similar to the PTA/SCC meetings held last October at each of the schools. It is important to know that, even though the meetings are listed as PTA/SCC meetings, they are open to the public. Again, your attendance and comments are important and make a difference. The employee meetings, I believe, will be limited to just employees of the district. Board members are encouraged to attend the meetings held in their respective areas. The Alpine/Highland/Cedar Hills schools' meetings are listed at the end of this post. The entire list will appear on the district's website, once finalized.

Public Input Meetings
In addition, there were be three public meetings held to discuss the bond. The dates for these meetings are Oct. 6, 13, 27 at 7pm. In addition to information on the bond, these meetings are an opportunity for the district to "tell our story".

Pamphlet
At each of the public meetings, a pamphlet will be distributed. It will contain information about the bond, Common Core, and the Mission, Vision, Values and Goals (MVVG) of the district. I assume since all three items will be on the pamphlet, that the input meetings can be used to provide input on any of those three issues. However, it may be limited to just the bond.

In short, please attend at least one of the public meetings and comment. We get the government we deserve. If we are passive about a $210M bond, what will it take to compel us to be involved?

******************************
SCC/PTA Bond Meetings for this area:

Sept. 13 @ 10am: Mountain Ridge JH
Sept. 20 @ 10am: Timberline
Sept. 27 @ 10am: Deerfield
Oct. 4 @ 10am: Alpine
Oct. 4 @ 1pm: Ridgeline
Oct. 6 @ 1pm: Lone Peak HS
Oct. 11 @ 1pm: Highland
Oct. 11 @ 1pm: Westfield

Plus don't forget the Public Input Meetings on Oct. 6, 13, 27

The Bond Age

2011-08-26T16:28:00.001-06:00

Let every man, every corporation, and especially let every village, town, and city, every county and State, get out of debt and keep out of debt. It is the debtor that is ruined by hard times.
--Rutherford B. Hayes

The board voted Aug. 16, 6-0, to approve putting the bond on the ballot for Nov. 8, with my reluctant support. The bond projects are specified here. I appreciate all those who attended and spoke about the bond. Your participation really does have an impact. We may have blogs, facebook, audio recordings, and minutes of meetings, but there is still something to be said for people taking the time to show up and comment.

In that vein, it appears the majority of people in our district are comfortable with the bond and our current process of going into debt to build and maintain our schools. The bond survey indicated a 70% approval for this bond. And, in the past 10 years, the bonds have passed with more than 60% support. Additionally, during the public bond meetings this spring, with very few exceptions, the emphasis was on what projects would go into the bond, not how do we avoid debt or limit the amount of the bond. In fact, over 700 people showed up to influence the inclusion of a new high school in Lehi at a single meeting.

I am opposed to continued debt. So, why would I vote in favor of the bond? Have I been corrupted? Bought? Co-opted? Having voted for me, I'd be saying, "What could she have been THINKING?" To change the direction of government requires a massive manifestation of the will of the people. I want us to get out of debt, whether through austerity or a less-painful, calculated plan. I do not find the status quo acceptable. However, the only way the debt status quo will change is if the vast majority of people are willing to do the "hard thing". The only way to get a commitment of the people is through a bond election.

I see three main perspectives on the bond. Which one are you?

Position 1.) I am comfortable with the way things are. I may not like the idea of debt, but this is how it has always been done. We need more schools, updated buildings, seismic fixes, and weight rooms. The bond isn't for very much money, and I am happy with the status quo.

Position 2.) I would love to get out of debt. However, there are certain things that are needed right now, e.g. schools for growth, seismic fixes. We don't have a system in place to take care of the current needs without additional debt. The bond is a necessary "evil", but a debt-reduction plan needs to be in place to stop the cycle right away. I am willing to make difficult decisions over the long term, but the immediate needs require bonding. I am inclined to vote for the bond, but will require the board to put a debt-reduction plan in place prior to my vote.

Position 3.) Debt is a huge problem, and I am willing to make the extremely difficult decisions necessary to combat the debt. Without drawing a line in the sand, I am afraid the cycle will never be broken. I believe we have the necessary tools, creativity, and community-involvement to do whatever is necessary to educate our kids without adding the burden of debt onto their shoulders.

No matter where you fit on the spectrum, your voice needs to be heard in this discussion. The district will be conducting multiple meetings about the bond throughout September and October to inform you (and, unofficially, encourage you) on the necessity of the bond. Even though the bond is on the ballot, your attendance and your vocal opinion will have an impact in those meetings, as well as at the ballot box. I have 3 requests. 1) Please commit to attend at least one meeting and comment. 2) Commit to bringing 2 neighbors with you. 3) Talk with at least 2 of your friends and neighbors about this issue. (Shameless plug: have them sign up for my facebook page, blog, and/or email.)

If the bond doesn't pass, would we find creative ways to educate our kids with these limitations? Yes. Necessity is the mother of invention. Because of the layering of the debt, there is a point at which we could borrow money for projects without increasing taxes. Would we be able to do all the projects we want? No. Would we be able to prioritize and pay for some of them? Yes. Could we get creative with double sessions, more online options, and giving kids credit for extra-curricular activities they are doing already? Sure. There is never just one option. Are you, the people, willing to go through that difficult process with us so we don't need to go into debt? I await your response on Nov. 8.

Bond Vote: Aug. 16, 2011 and Public Hearing

2011-08-16T00:35:00.001-06:00

The Tuesday Board Meeting will include a public hearing on the bond. I am unsure whether it will comprise part of the community comments or be given a separate hearing. I would recommend you attend. The meeting begins at 6:00 and your opinion should be heard.

Personally, I would like to see a paradigm shift from one of constant bonding (every 5 years) to one of a pay-as-you-go system. I realize this will take many years to be able to save and get out from under our current debt. However, if we don't start now, we will be that much further behind. As a board, it is our role to provide the overall vision of the district. I would also like to see smaller bonds, more frequently for one or two specific projects. Lumping a bunch of projects together over a 5-year period is much easier on the board and the district, but it eliminates the in-depth discussion from the public. If every project on the bond were to be debated and voted on by the public, it would provide for greater accountability and greater public input.

In short, there is not currently a comfortable way to accommodate the seismic needs, repairs, and growth without bonding. This is the system, right now, but we need to change the system. We pay just under $50M/year in principal and interest on our debt. A long time ago, we got into the habit of paying for buildings with debt. If we had not, we would have nearly $250M over the next 5 years to cover all the planned bond projects with almost $40M left over in a rainy day fund. We need to break this habit.

Money spent on interest is money that never reaches the classroom. The principal provides for the brick and mortar, but the interest is only valued by investors. We are losing in interest what we should invest directly on our children's education.

Bond Projects--Proposal

High School: Lehi Area--$59M (2013-16)
Middle School: Eagle Mountain--$31.5M (2012-14)
Elementary Schools (4): Locations to be determined by growth--$12-14M ea. (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016)
AFHS: New classrooms/gyms/parking--$19.5M (2012-13)
PGHS: New athletic facility/gym/dance--$6.75M (2014-15)
Lone Peak HS: Weight/cardio classrooms--$575K (2016)
Timp HS: Weight/cardio classrooms--$450K (2016)
AFJH: 14-16 classrooms--$4.3M (2013-14)
Lehi JH: parking and drop off--$575K (2013)
Orem JH: New gym/seismic--$5.6M (2014-15)
Cherry Hill: Partial reconstruction (seismic)--$8.25M (2012-13)
Scera Park: parking/drop off--$575K (2016)
Westmore: Reconstruction (seismic)--$8.575M (2012-13)
Sego Lily: Seismic--$825K (2012-13)
Grovecrest: Partial reconstruction (seismic)--$6.75M (2016)
Alpine: Seismic--$1.845M (2012-13)

Here is the agenda for Aug. 16, 2011.

DISTRICT OFFICE BOARD ROOM
575 NORTH 100 EAST
AMERICAN FORK

STUDY SESSION
4:00 P.M.
The purpose of the study session will be for (1) professional development for the Board, (2) to
review bond projects and the resolution for the November 8 bond election, and (3) to discuss
other current issues.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING
6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE
COMMUNITY COMMENTS
MINUTES
CLAIMS FOR JULY

ROUTINE BUSINESS
1. Budget Report
2. Personnel Reports
3. Alpine Foundation Report
4. Resolution 2011-013 - Agreement with Lehi City for Street Improvements Adjacent to LHS

ACTION ITEMS
1. Resolution for Bond Election on November 8, 2011

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS
CLOSED SESSION
ADJOURNMENT

Does the End Justify the Means?

2011-08-04T10:35:00.007-06:00

On July 18, the board had a retreat. The main discussion items were 1) Common Core, 2) Mission, Vision, Values, and Goals (MVVG), 3) Code of Conduct, and 4) Individual Board Member Comments.

Part 1: Common Core

This is going to be a topic of on-going discussions for the foreseeable future. Over the next year, our district will be training teachers, and getting ready to implement the State Board's decision to adopt the Common Core standards, along with the Smarter Balance Consortium's (SBCC) federally-funded assessments (by 2014). We were privileged to have Syd Dickson from the State Office of Education (USOE) present on the Common Core. Oneof the things I appreciated hearing was that, even though the Common Core organization is going to be creating standards for more subjects than just Language Arts and Math, the State Board has decided NOT to adopt anything else, especially in the realm of Social Studies or Science.

My concern is Language Arts, with the emphasis on 'informational texts' is sufficient for allowing things into our curriculum that local parents may not be comfortable with. I would submit that all writing is done from a particular point of view. Presenting informational articles to our children will come with its own agenda. One of the reasons for local control is to make sure the 'slant' is representative of what our parents are comfortable having presented to their children. And rather than presenting things via literature, which is admittedly fictional, information text comes with its own brand of authority. Children, supposedly, should be taught to analyze these texts, but at what age are they capable of deep, cognitive thinking? Certainly not in Kindergarten when 'research' writing begins with Common Core.

Ms. Dickson also said being part of the SBCC assessment group and Common Core, in general, will give us greater ability to impact textbook and resource creation. One concern a teacher in our district had was the integrated math (algebra, geometry, etc integrated at all grade-levels) was being used only by Utah and no other states. How important will we be in that process, if we are the only state using this approach? Her response was we are the only state implementing it across the board. However, there are quite a few individual districts choosing to implement the integrated process. This leads me to wonder how much leeway districts in other states have in their implementation, and why should we not have that leeway, as well?

Ms. Dickson wanted to make sure we understood that Common Core is NOT a federal or national standards program and that this was a big myth out there. We clarified that the US Dept. of Ed. is funding the assessment piece, and she said they were. However, there is supposed to be a database of questions for the assessments the USOE will use to create Utah's assessments. These assessments will be formative (chapter tests, etc. during the year), summative (end of the year assessments), as well as computer-adaptive. One concern some of the board members share is the ability of the computer-adaptive tests to actually work. The idea is that, based on the answer to any given question, the assessment program will generate a more in-depth question to test deeper understanding. I would be curious to see this in practice. As a programmer, I know, first-hand, the options in a program are only as good as the author(s) are able to predict and account for them. Also, how accurate will writing assessments be, when done by computer?

Finally, we were told the Common Core was not done outside of public scrutiny. Quite a few of the professional associations both inside and outside the state were involved. A few of us commented that we were unaware of Common Core, and its existence isn't widely known among parents. There was a lot of parental input on the standards, Ms. Dickson said. When I asked who was involved locally, I was told that if it had just been a Utah project, a lot more local people would have been involved. However, since it was comprised of 45 or so states, there wasn't much Utah public input.

Rep. John Dougall (R-Highland) attended the presentation as well, and was asked by Board Member, Mark Clement, for his comments. Roughly, Rep. Dougall stated that standards don't guarantee outcomes, and that good standards are always watered down by committees over time. As an engineer, he suggested benchmarking. Benchmarking is where you find who is doing the best job, say, in math. Then you compare your results against theirs. It was suggested that having common assessments would make that easier. However, our district could simply adopt the math assessments used by the benchmark district. There is no reason we couldn't do such a thing right now. I appreciated Rep. Dougall's perspective.

As long as your child is achieving on a national test, are you comfortable giving control of their education to some group of 'experts' you will never meet and have no influence over? Local control has always ensured local responsibility and accountability. Common Core changes that. Are you comfortable with the change?

If you would like to regain local control and challenge the concept that outside experts know more about your children's education than you do, click "like" on this Facebook link and maybe even go so far as to click "share". "Like" helps me know where people stand on a specific issue and who might participate in advancing the perspective. "Share" means you believe in the perspective so much, you would like to share the perspective with others. Either is appreciated.
Note: The audio of all board meetings is available by law--often (after a period of time) on the ASD website (under board meetings), and always, by request, from the district office.

3 Elementary Schools Planned for Rebuild in Orem with the Bond

2011-07-22T16:00:00.000-06:00

The Bond
On July 19, the Board met to discuss, mostly for the last time before the bond vote, the individual projects scheduled for the bond monies. The board will vote on Aug. 16, whether or not to put the bond to the voters at the November election.

The biggest change in bond projects was the recommendation to rebuild 3 elementary schools in Orem. All three have seismic issues and are quite old (around 50 years or so). They are: Cherry Hill, Westmore, and Grovecrest. Geneva also needs to be rebuilt, but, due to its proximity to Suncrest, the board might want to think about building one school in between Geneva and Suncrest. Then, we could combine their student populations. In doing this, the cost of the 3 schools went from an estimate of $11.6M to $23.4M. This means other projects scheduled for the bond will be pushed out, and some will be taken care of with Capital funds. The business office put together criteria for determining which projects made sense to rebuild, and which should just be fixed. The criteria were based on dollars, years of useful life left (50 years being the useful life limit), seismic prioritization, and whether or not the dollar amount was too high to realistically be handled with on-going capital funds. In general, anything over $2M warranted a rebuild.

The board, while concerned for those schools that were pushed out, was overwhelmingly supportive of the idea of rebuilding the older schools. The Superintendent noted that the Orem City Council were also very supportive of the rebuild idea. I asked for more information on student population and capacity, as well as projected growth. I was told that we could, indeed, be more economically prudent by closing neighborhood schools in some cases, but the immeasurable cost to the individual communities would be devastating. The idea of having neighborhood schools is something that previous boards have been supportive of, and most people in a community are supportive of, as well. My fellow board members were pleased with the idea of starting from scratch instead of using a 'band aid' on these schools. I still wanted to know the opportunity cost for this, but was clearly in the minority. I understand the possible concerns related to closing schools. However, I think it is only fiscally responsible to know what the costs actually are before making a decision. I agree that there are non-monetary costs that come into play. However, we should at least explore the possibilities before making those decisions. Again, I was in the minority with that mind-set.

As the Board President went around the room to assess our thoughts on the bond projects, most were basically supportive. I offered only 2 comments. 1) I am uncomfortable with going into debt to fund weight room expansions at Lone Peak and Timpanogos. It is based on the principle that we shouldn't be going into debt, and we, if necessary, could pay for this with capital funds at some point in the future--if the priority is sufficient. It is readily acknowledged that there do need to be projects in all the areas of the district to gain widespread support for the bond. The weight room addition is the only bond project in North Orem and only the second bond project in the Northeast (Highland, Alpine, etc). 2) We had discussed the desirability of getting out of debt and going to a "pay as you go" plan for capital costs at our retreat on Monday. I suggested that a bond would be better accepted by the fiscally-concerned should we have a plan to get out of debt, even if it were saving just a small amount of money every year. The downside to this: Whatever we save for future needs, we aren't able to spend now on existing needs. The overall philosophy of the board was suggested to be that getting out of debt is important and something we want to strive for. However, due to the current economics, it isn't something that is feasible now. Someday, it will be.

The seismic projects still on the bond are as follows:

Alpine Elementary (seismic only): $1.845M
Orem Jr (addition and seismic): $5.5M
Sego Lily (seismic only): $825,000

It is important to note, the remaining seismic projects are still projected for, under our 5-year capital plan. As the board gets capital funds every year, they will prioritize which projects should be undertaken and when. However, it does depend on funding and priorities, every year. Right now, the seismic retrofittings will take until 2020 to complete throughout the district. To download the seismic priority list, click here.

Why I Voted Against the Budget

2011-07-14T23:03:00.001-06:00

Board Meeting: Budget Approval--June 21
The Board Meeting was held on June 21, and included approval of the final budget for 2010-11 and the tentative budget for 2011-12. The formal budget was available online as of June 1, and I received a hard copy about that same time. We had 3 weeks to review the budget. Throughout the year, different items are brought up that impact the budget, and the board more or less approves them at the time. Also, there are a few budget committee meetings that narrow down and prioritize items to be addressed in the budget, e.g. building maintenance requirements. However, I would like to see a shift to allow the board and the public more time to address issues in the budget and see revisions, much before the June 22 approval date, as required by law. Ideally, the proposed budget would be made public near the beginning of May. The May board meeting would allow the board to discuss different options. I'd, also, suggest having a public input meeting to take place in May. Then any changes or suggestions could be incorporated in a revised budget, available June 1. (Highland City followed this procedure and had a public Open House in May, just before a City Council meeting where the budget was discussed. I commend them for this step and borrowed liberally from their process.)

My main issue, besides the overall budget schedule, was $860,000 for Common Core implementation. As you've read previously, I am concerned with the lack of local control that will come with Common Core. The way it works is the State Office of Education has decided all Utah Schools (district and charter) will adopt the Common Core (including the out-sourced, US Dept of Ed-financed assessments). What is tested, determines the curriculum. At the time of the budget adoption, the Board had never discussed Common Core. We were allocating funds because the State Office said as much. They dictate, we fund. The Common Core training began the day before the budget was approved, and about $70,000 was put into the budget to be spent (post-July 1) to pay those teachers participating in the week-long training. Because this is a fundamental shift of educational responsibility, I felt the board needed to at least address Common Core before allocating funds. I asked that the $860,000 be "held in abeyance" until the board could discuss Common Core. I was outvoted on setting that money aside. As such, I felt I wasn't doing my due diligence in approving the $860,000, even if it was only 1/400 of the budget. It represents such a large potential change, it didn't seem right for me to approve something that hadn't even been discussed. I was the only "Nay" vote. My fellow board member, Paula Hill, voted to abstain, with a comment that she was doing so because of the nearly $1M for Common Core implementation.

Eagle Mountain Middle School Property
The board approved the purchase of a property for the proposed Middle School in Eagle Mountain. The decision was between two different pieces of property. The board weighed the overall costs, necessary improvements, transportation, power, etc. in making this decision. It was not a decision made lightly, and there was a lot of community input. In short, when all the different factors were laid out, the SITLA property was the best deal. One nice thing is that our agreement includes the improvements to be made on the property. They will make the improvements to our specifications and with our approval prior to closing on escrow. And the overall price came in lower than the other option.

Collective Bargaining and Trust Lands Funds
Also approved were the various agreements with the associations: Administrators, Teachers, and Education Support Services. One of the biggest issues was the healthcare cost increase, due to the "ObamaCare" mandates. It amounted to about $4M for the year. The other issue was the board approved a 2% increase for teachers who were not due an increase due to 'step and lane'. Essentially, the district pay schedule has different lanes that teachers are on, depending on education level. For example, a teacher with a Bachelor's degree is on a particular lane. Another teacher with a Master's Degree is on a different lane. Both start at step 1, if they are brand new. But the lane for the Bachelor's degree pays less for Step 1, than does the Master's Degree lane. After so many years, they advance to Step 2, and so forth. If you are somewhere between Step 1 and Step 2, for example, this year, you will get a one time 2% bonus (probably in November).

The individual school's submitted their trustlands plans, and the board approved them.

Meeting with Lt. Governor
On July 5, various teachers, employees, administrators, board members, and legislators met with Lt. Gov. Greg Bell and the Governor's education advisor, Christine Kearl. Different members of the administration outlined some of the things Alpine is doing well:

Modified Extended Day schedules: Many of our elementary schools are set up with AM and PM students. The AM students come at 8 and leave at 2:15; the PM kids come at 9:15 and leave at 3:30. This allows each teacher to have smaller class sizes for 150 min each day.
Productivity: Teachers who teach more students in a class--whether through modified extended day, or more classes/day--are paid 14 - 23 % more
Extended Day Kindergarten (OEK): Kindergarten students who score below a certain level are given the option of attending full day kindergarten. The class size is an average of 16 students, as compared with 24 or so in the regular kindergarten classes. Students in OEK out-perform their peers in the regular Kindergarten classes.

Sen. Howard Stephenson commented on how well ASD does with its finances, as recognized by the Utah Taxpayers' Association. Board members comments ranged from putting the 'flexible WPU' as an 'above the line' item in the budget (reimburse the districts for what they actually spend on SS and Medicare with state monies, and not just lump that amount into a 'discretionary' category when SS/Medicare are anything but discretionary), experimentation with technology, recognition that ASD does a great job with large classes and a growing population, but it would be better to have smaller class sizes, and my comment: more local control--do not legislate and dictate what the local boards can/should do. Either we want local control or we don't, but let's not pay lip service to local control.

Agenda for Board Training on July 18--Timberline Middle School
Twice a year, the board has a retreat/training for most of a day. This is the second one I will be participating in. Since this meeting constitutes a quorum of the board, it is an open, public meeting. As a board, we have been asked to submit our comments/suggestions for the Boardmanship discussion, as well as the afternoon discussion items. You may want to check out the links from the district website for more information on the Code of Conduct and the Board, itself. Also, if you haven't had a chance to review the Common Core FAQ's, please do so...see especially the final question about Federal involvement. I welcome your comments and feedback both prior to and after the training.

8:30 – 9:00 a.m. Common Core Review & Discussion: Syd Dickson, USOE

9:00 – 10:00 Discussion of Board Issues: Debbie

10:00 – 10:15 Break

10:15 – 11:15 Continue Discussion of Board Issues

11:15 – 12:00 Review History of District Mission, Vision, Values, Goals: Vern / Debbie

12:00 – 12:45 p.m. Lunch

12:45 – 2:00 Boardsmanship: Debbie

2:00 – 2:15 Break

2:15 – 3:30 Board Training – Discussion of Leadership by Sully: Barry Graff

Board Meeting Agenda: July 19--District Office

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to (1) review details for the November 2011 bond, (2) for Board inservice and (3) to discuss other current issues.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE: Debbie TaylorPresident

REVERENCE

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS FOR JUNE :Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report: Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report

4. Resolution 2011-011 – Contract with Orem City for Law Enforcement Officers

5. Resolution 2011-012 – Easement Agreement with UDOT for Property Adjacent to Vineyard Elem.

ACTION ITEMS

1. 2013-2014 School Calendar: Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S Debbie Taylor, Board President

INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Common Core, Budget, New Property and Lots More

2011-06-17T21:13:00.004-06:00

Common Core

Before you read on, I ask you to do one thing. Please view this video on the Common Core. Once you view it, please pass the link on to at least 4 other people. Common Core is taking place, and we, the people, have yet to have the debate over the pros and cons.

"Ever since the Federal Government, in the mid-sixties, became heavily involved in public education, we've been consistently fighting that battle over standardization versus freedom. Freedom should be our goal."
--Utah Congressman (and former public school teacher) Rob Bishop

My fellow board member, Paula Hill, has written an excellent piece on the Common Core. Click here to see her comments. She states it very well, and adds the perspective of a school teacher.

Americans have a history of prizing and valuing local control, especially when it comes to the education of our children. We want an educated populace, but we take seriously the responsibility that parents have of doing just that. At the top of my blog, you will see a quote from Jefferson about turning education of children over to "any other general authority of the government". Jefferson's opinion was that parents needed to manage the schools, and that believing government could do it better was a complete fairy tale (his words "a belief against all experience"). The responsibility for education rests with the parents. Our schools exist to aid parents in this responsibility. Common Core takes this idea and allows us to turn the responsibility and the accountability over to another pseudo-government entity, unelected, and unaccountable to you as a parent. As the teacher in the above video mentions, if she has concerns with what her children are being taught, she can't go to the school, the district, or even the state anymore. This is a fundamental transformation of the responsibility, the accountability, and the power associated with educating our children.

Budget/Agenda for 6/21/11

The 2011-12 budget for the school district is on the agenda for Tuesday's Board meeting (along with Trustlands plan approvals, and association (teachers, school support services, and administrators) labor contracts. For full agenda, please see below or click here. I would like to see more public, as well as board, involvement in the budget process earlier on. I have discussed this subject with the administration, but will be discussing it with the full board, hopefully, during the study session. Associated with the Common Core thread, from above, the proposed budget contains $860K for implementation of the Common Core.

New Property for Junior High in Eagle Mountain

On the Agenda for Tuesday's meeting is the proposed purchase of property for the new Junior High in Eagle Mountain. There have been two properties under consideration, and many of you have written to express your thoughts about the different options. We have taken into account, bussing costs, infrastructure costs, power needs, as well as the overall land prices. The bottom line is when all these things are accounted for, the proposal for the Mid-Valley location makes the most sense, both financially and logistically. I would be happy to answer any questions you might have about why I will be supporting this purchase.

Meeting with Eagle Mountain City

Wednesday, I had the opportunity to meet with the Mayor and City Council Members of Eagle Mountain City, along with my fellow board members. It was good to get their perspective on their growing population. We discussed the needs the district has when looking at properties for new schools. The city often requires large developers to include plans for school sites as they present their plans to the city for approval. We discussed when would be the appropriate time for the district to be involved in that process.

Agenda

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to receive an overview of the proposed 2011-2012 M&O budget and an update regarding the proposed November 2011 bond.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE

REVERENCE

RECOGNITIONS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS FOR MAY

ROUTINE BUSINESS
1. Budget Report

2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report

4. Student Releases

5. Student Expulsion

6. Student Reinstatements

7. Property Items

A. Resolution 2011-009 – Purchase of Property in Eagle Mountain

B. Resolution 2011-010 – Sale of Property in Saratoga to LDS Church

ACTION ITEMS
1. Adoption of Bond Resolution and Designated Officer

2. Public Hearing – Approval of the 2010-2011 Final Budget

3. Public Hearing – Approval of the 2011-2012 Tentative Budget

4. Approval of the 2011-2012 School Land Trust Plans

5. Approval of the 2011-2012 Certified Negotiated Agreement

6. Approval of the 2011-2012 Classified Negotiated Agreement

7. Approval of the 2011-2012 Administrative Agreement

DISCUSSION/ACTION ITEM
1. Proposed Change of Date for August Board Meeting – to August 16

DISCUSSION ITEM
1. Revised 2013-2014 School Calendar

REPORTS
1. Membership Report

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Proposed 2012 Budget

2011-06-03T07:50:00.000-06:00

The proposed budget for this next fiscal year can be downloaded from the district's website here. I am personally thrilled that it is listed as one of the 'revolving' items on the main page of the website. Thanks to our district staff for getting this information out to the public in such an easily accessible format!

Please take a moment to peruse the budget and give me your feedback. A printed, bound copy was delivered to me yesterday.

School Finance from USBA Convention Jan. 2011

2011-05-28T23:37:00.000-06:00

When I gave my husband a draft of this post to proof-read, he said he felt like Marlin in "Finding Nemo" when the little turtle, Squirt, is explaining the proper exiting procedure from the EAC. He said, "I know you are telling me something really important, I just don't understand a word you're saying." So, I will give you the Reader's Digest Version, and then the full Geek/Accountant-type version. Hopefully, one of them will appeal to you.

School Finance: Reader's Digest Version
Every year by June 22, the board must approve a budget, essentially allocating different money into different categories (think envelopes). After the budget is set, the district has flexibility in spending the money within each category, according to the policies and procedures the board has already outlined. Starting on June 1, the proposed budget is available from the Business Administrator to anyone who wants to see it. ASD has past budgets on the website, in case you are really interested.

The district receives money from 3 sources: local taxes (including property taxes), state taxes (100% of your income tax goes to public education), and federal taxes. Each of these taxing sources comes with some strings and/or limitations. The state provides a set amount per student, called the WPU (weighted pupil unit). In addition, if there are certain programs the legislature wants to fund, certain amounts are allowed for those programs. Of course, if you wanted to use that money for something else, you can't. The Feds, of course, have their own set of strings. ASD gets about 7% of its budget from the Feds.

Every year, the County sets a specific tax rate for the district, called the Certified Tax Rate. If the district wants to increase that rate, there will be a public hearing for that purpose in August or September. Of course, since the fiscal year started back in July, the public hearing is more of a formality than anything else. The board can, at any time in the year, amend the budget in an open board meeting. But, unless something major occurs, that probably won't happen.

On your property tax notice, you will see 2 line items for Alpine School District: Basic and Other. The Basic rate is set by the state. The Other is a combination of all the taxes (leeways, bonds, etc) set by the local school board. Bear in mind, that property taxes can only go to pay for capital items. All operational costs come from the state via WPU and specific programs/items or from the Feds (with their specific programs).

I would appreciate your looking at the budget and giving me feedback. I will see if there is a link on the district's website and will post it here after June 1st.

School Finance: Accountant's Version
Schools get revenue from local, state, and federal sources.

Local:
Local funds come in the form of property taxes and other fees. There are 2 line items on your property tax statement: Basic and Other.

Other Property: Other property taxes are leeway, capital, transportation, debt service, tort, and recreation. All primary residential property is taxed at 55%. For example, if your home is worth $200K, whatever the property tax rate is you pay taxes on only 55% or $110K. Commercial property is taxed at 100% of the property value. The school board sets the tax rate. If the tax rate goes above the Certified Tax Rate the county sets, you must have a truth in taxation hearing. It isn't as logical as it sounds either. Here is an example:

Say in 2010 your property is worth $1000 and the certified tax rate is 10%, so you pay $100 in taxes. In 2011, your property value increases 5% to $1050. 10% of that would be $105. Since $105 is more than the $100 you paid in 2010, the board would need to hold a truth in taxation hearing.  Even though the tax rate remained the same, the amount of taxes received increases. Hence, the hearing. In order to avoid a hearing, the tax rate would need to be adjusted in 2011 to 9.5%, so that 9.5% of $1050 = $100. All new buildings and new growth are exempt from the truth in taxation hearing, and the taxes are county- or district-wide, so it is possible for your individual property taxes to go up without a hearing. However, it means that somewhere else, someone is paying less for their property taxes, and it all balances out across the district. Just by way of information, in 1980, the average property tax rate in Utah was 0.004534. In 2009-10, it was 0.001433. So, the rates have gone down, but values and growth have increased.

There are other local revenues that come from investment income, inter-district billings (e.g. some of our kids go to Provo and some Provo kids go to ASD, so we pay each other for those kids), school lunch fees, and community education programs.

Basic Property: The basic property tax rate is the only local tax that is NOT set by the local school board, but by the state legislature. This basic amount is currently 10% of the property value that is able to be taxed (e.g. 55% on a primary residence). This is the other line item on your property tax statement that says Alpine School District: Basic.

State Funds:
WPU: The weighted-pupil unit is an amount set by the legislature for each student that attends class for 180 days (membership or enrollment).  This year, the WPU is $2577. The WPU is given to districts/schools based on the difference between last year's membership and this year's membership as of Oct. 1. For example, if on Oct. 1, 2010 there are 5% more kids in ASD than there were from Aug. 2009- May. 2010, then there will be a 5% increase in WPU funds. (I think.)

Other State Funds: The state tries to equalize the amount spent, per student, across the state in some fashion. Here is my attempt at explaining this. Let's say we have two districts (A and B), each with 5000 students. District A has property tax values of $100 million. District B has property tax values of $40 million. Each district will receive $12.885 million in WPU funds ($2577 x 5000 students). They will also get 10% of the property values in the form of the Basic school levy. District A will receive $10 million, and District B will receive $4 million. Because of the $6 million deficit for District B, the state will kick in $6 million more in state funds to District B, than to District A from their pool of state income taxes, etc.

Additionally, the state gives extra funds for the following:
Professional staff (more higher degrees)
Special Ed
Career Tech Ed
Class Size Reduction (one time money)
*WPU Flexible (SS, Medicare, and Retirement)
Transportation
Other

*The WPU Flexible is for SS, Medicare, and Retirement for staff. It used to be that the state reimbursed the districts for all of the amount they spent on these items.  After that, they reimbursed a percentage of these amounts. Now, there is just a line item in the budget, called WPU Flexible; it is a fixed amount. The board can use whatever amount is in here to pay for SS, Medicare, and Retirement, but these amounts have to be paid by law.

Federal funds:
Federal funds are given, based on different programs. These are:
Title I: Poverty, Mobility, ESL
Title 2: Quality Teaching
Special Ed
School Lunch (free or reduced lunches)
ARRA (Obama's Stimulus)
Edujobs

The biggest issue with federal funds is that the money must not supplant existing funds and there needs to be MOE (Maintenance of Effort). For example, if you spent $1000 on special ed last year, you can't reduce the amount this year and still get federal funds--regardless of the reason. You also can't take the $1000 of special ed monies that you were going to use, spend it somewhere else, and finance special ed with ONLY the federal funds. Federal funds must be used IN ADDITION to state and local funds.

Expenditures:
85-90% of general fund expenses are salaries and benefits. Currently, 18% of salary goes to retirement, 7.65% SS/Medicare, and 30% Health Insurance.

Other expenses are: professional services like nursing, utilities, textbooks/library books, instructional supplies and equipment.

Accounting:

Think of accounting funds as budget envelopes. A board sets certain amounts for each envelope (fund). Within that fund, the district has some discretion, but moving money between funds is not usually allowed.

In general the funds are:
General (operational costs)
Capital (things that last for 1 year or more: furniture, buildings, computers, etc)
Non-K-12
Debt Service
Lunch Service

The board must have the budget set by June 22 of each year, but the public attends a hearing in Aug or Sept. if the tax rate (see above) is greater than the certified tax rate from the previous year. The difficulty is the budget is already set and started on before the public is involved in the hearings. It would make more sense for the public to get involved in the budget process during April, May and June of each year. The superintendent is ultimately responsible for the budget, and you CANNOT (by law) budget a surplus.

Audits:
Annual audits are done by independent third parties. They look at whether you are following your district policies, how you are allocating revenues, state compliance issues, federal law or grant compliance, and payments, especially to the board, superintendent, and business administrator. They do not tend to audit how the money is spent other than on a general level of following policies.

At the end of this class, we were given a quiz. The first person who finished with 100% got a box of M&M's. They were yummy! (smile)

The Bond Dilemma and Board Meeting 5/17/11

2011-05-19T13:38:00.000-06:00

As you probably know, Alpine School District will, most likely, be asking you to approve a $210M bond in November. Before you continue reading, I hope you will take the time to watch the online bond presentation, if you didn't attend one of the meetings. This way, I know you will have all the basic information and assumptions: the whys, the hows, and the how much.   The bond is divided into growth, renovations/additions, seismic retrofitting, and additional projects. The additional projects will probably take a back seat to everything else.

New Lehi High

The biggest change from the original draft proposal is a new high school for Lehi at the "Micron property" that the district already owns. The estimated cost is $56M, but construction won't begin until 2014 at the earliest. In that period of time, Lehi High will grow to almost 2500 students. Part of the reason for the delay is the overall cost. The bonds will be issued in phases to take advantage of the amount of current debt being paid off every year. We attempt to keep our debt pretty much level; so as we pay off some debt, we don't go into so much more debt that it spikes both the debt ratio and the taxes.

Seismic Issues

In 2006, Reaveley Engineering did a very in-depth study of seismic issues in the district. From that report, the district has been going down a path of seismic retrofitting. The 2006 study didn't include some additional items that the district has included like high, unreinforced chimneys (all of which have been replaced). Also, at the time of the study, there were projects already in process, and they were simply completed. This is why some projects of a lower priority were done prior to others. Also, our experience with having corrected some of the seismic issues is that the overall $54M price tag was way too low. For example, Reaveley estimated the cost to fix Orem HS at $8M. When we had actual bids from two different firms, they said the amount was closer to $16M. It was the $16M price tag that encouraged the district to tear Orem down and rebuild a new school on the same site. Before the final bond decision in August, the board should have additional information on the most "problematic" areas with better estimates from the companies that would actually be hired to do the retrofitting. My personal thought is we are responsible to correct seismic (and any other obvious safety issues) in our schools before worrying about additional things like multi-purpose rooms, weight rooms, or the space center. One of my colleagues clarified that having too many kids in a weight room can pose a safety risk as well. Additionally, the difficulty with seismic issues is they are so dependent on so many unknowns. I applaud the district for commissioning this study five years ago, and for embarking on a long journey to correct these issues across the district. If there were a way to correct all the major seismic issues throughout the district on this bond, I'd be happy to do that.

Renovations and Additions

Some of the renovations and additions patrons discussed during the bond meetings were additional classrooms, weight rooms, PE rooms, tennis courts, etc. An interesting comment at one meeting about how great Lone Peak's weight room isand how other schools in the district couldn't compete with them. Then, at another meeting, people commented how Lone Peak's weight room needed improvements. As one person put it, the process is really like a moving jigsaw puzzle. We need to keep in mind that with limited resources, everyone can't have everything all at once. And by the time one area is improved, another is going to need it.

Eagle Mountain Junior High

Another bond project is building a new junior high in the Eagle Mountain area. Westlake High will be growing to 4000 students by about 2016 if they continue to house 9th - 12th grades. The plan is to open a new junior high in Eagle Mountain by Fall 2013, taking students from Vista Heights and bringing the 9th grade back there from Westlake. The district is hoping to secure property this summer and have the architechtural work and builders all set to begin work by Feb. 2012. Before the property is purchased, the terms of the purchase will be made public, and the board will approve the purchase in an open board meeting.

Other Thoughts on the Bond

As someone who is very concerned with additional debt, I would love to find a way to pay off our existing debt and finance these new buildings and improvements with cash. And if it couldn't be done with this bond (because of the immediate needs), maybe we could put something in place to start down the road of pay-as-you-go for the next set of projects in five years. However, it seems that most people are fine with the way things are. About every 5 years, the district will go out for another bond, and build new schools, as well as renovate older schools. The debt level will remain roughly the same, and the bonds will be aggressively financed for 15 years or less. In order to do something other than "the way it's always been done", the changes would need to be very dramatic, very "outside the box". Those ideas could be: modifications to the school year/calendar/attendance time, more online/distance learning classes, additional credits allowed for private lessons (e.g. music credits for private music lessons), a change in scope of the state core and graduation requirements, building smaller schools with less amenities, etc.  One of the concerns about building smaller, less fancy schools is they are also to double as community centers. If one community gets all the bells and whistles, the other communities are concerned that they helped fund bells and whistles for someone else but didn't get any at their own schools.

Another consideration, that has been absent in these discussions, is the impact of the Vineyard URA. As I write, the URA is still going forward. SB70 was passed this last legislative session, and it changes the vote on something like Vineyard from a 2/3 majority to a simple majority. In effect, the school districts will be required to go along with every URA without a chance at stopping them. Since the districts, on average, make up about 65-70% of the tax revenue collected from an area, there is no reason for any other taxing entity (city, county, etc) to not vote to support URA's. The districts will make up the majority of the tax deferral, and the local community will benefit. The schools and taxpayers throughout the district will be taken along for the ride by financing the bulk of these developments. So, having said that, the URA, absent something dramatic to stop it, will impact you whether or not there is a bond. Your property taxes will be increased, and it will look as if the district increased them. So, when we talk about the property taxes going up $12 the first year and as much as $36 the fourth or fifth year, that is just the impact of the bond. Vineyard will impact you the full $36 or more starting this first year.

In short, I am very uncomfortable with debt, and incurring more is doubly difficult for me. The district currently has $389M in debt, being paid off at the rate of $30M+ in principal and $15M in interest every year. If there were a good way of eliminating our debt and applying that $15M in interest toward future projects, that is how I'd like to see things done. However, as is, the debt is phased in, and its level is maintained. If we must have debt, I think we are doing a good job at maintaining fiscal discipline on that front. Additionally, we are obligated to the families in our district to provide a good, safe learning environment for the kids in our schools.  To delay addressing current growth and safety concerns just exacerbates the problem. The current method is to bond every five years to fund the seismic/safety retrofitting, as well as new schools for population growth. It is not my preferred method of operation, but until there is a better alternative, this is the system we have.

May 17, 2011 Board Meeting Agenda

2011-05-13T23:09:00.001-06:00

Please go to the district website to download the documentation for the meeting here. The meeting will be at the district office. All are welcome to attend both sessions.

STUDY SESSION
4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to (1) review assignments and protocol for the upcoming high school graduations and protocol for board members, (2) review feedback from the bond meetings, and (3) discuss other current issues. Read more info on the bond, including the seismic information here.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING
6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE
RECOGNITIONS
COMMUNITY COMMENTS*
MINUTES
CLAIMS FOR MARCH AND APRIL
ROUTINE BUSINESS
1. Budget Report
2. Personnel Reports “
3. Alpine Foundation Report “
4. Student Releases - KA, BA, CA, BB, GB, CB “
MC, TC, JD, MD, NF, NG, WG, CG, JH, MH
TH, ZH, RK, AK, ML, TM, AO, KP, TR, CS
SS, KV, WW, TW, CW, LY “
5. Student Expulsion – ND “
6. Student Reinstatements – MB, DG
7. Investment Report
8. Property Items A. Resolution #2011-007 - Purchase of Old Cedar Fort School
B. Resolution #2011-008 - MATC Lease and Easement Agreement
ACTION ITEMS
1. Resolution 2011-003 – Dissolution of ATEC Fund
2. Resolution 2011-004 – Investment Changes “
3. Resolution 2011-005 – Fund Balance “
4. Resolution 2011-006 – Approval of Architect Firms “
DISCUSSION/ACTION ITEM
1. Parameters Resolution for Refinancing Bonds
DISCUSSION ITEMS
1. 2013-2014 School Calendar
REPORTS
1. Membership Report
BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S
INFORMATION ITEMS
CLOSED SESSION
ADJOURNMENT

*Time set aside for community comments is not a time to discuss specific personnel issues. Personnel issues are not appropriate discussion items for an open-meeting environment. If you have a personnel concern, we ask that you contact a member of the administration or put your concern in writing and address it to the Board of Education.

Common Core: Funding and Teaching to the Test

2011-04-27T23:10:00.005-06:00

I have just returned from the National School Boards Association Convention. In my last class on tests and assessments, the presenter said something very interesting. The US Department of Education has set aside $330 Million for the creation of assessments for the Common Core Standards. I had heard of the consortia for the assessment piece of the Common Core. However, I had not heard the US Department of Education was involved in any way with them.

Throughout this Common Core discussion, it has been repeated ad infinitum that the Common Core is NOT a national standard. Instead, it is a collection of states coming together, voluntarily, to create a core curriculum. During my initial introduction to the Common Core, a fellow board member was immediately interested in who would be doing the assessments. At the time, she said something like, "We all know that teachers have to teach to the test, so it's important to know who will be creating the tests." The presenter discussed how, when a new test is introduced, the scores drop. As teachers get more information about the test and what's on it, they modify their teaching to help their students have greater achievement on the test. He said, "This isn't cheating." It's just that more information and more data yields better preparation. In short, we teach to the test. The question is whether what we are measuring is the information we want our students to learn.

Alpine School District is required to follow the core curriculum as established by the State Office of Education. The State Office has decided to require the Common Core, and all school districts in Utah will need to implement the Common Core by 2012-2013. The State Office recommended that we start this coming year, but ASD's administration has wisely opted to delay a year to properly train our teachers. And, I would add, to learn from the mistakes of others. My concern with the Common Core is not the standards themselves. My concern is it violates the principle of local control. What our schools and students need should be managed by the people of our area and not dictated from on high. Certainly we can learn from others, but where the rubber meets the road, it is our parents, our teachers, and our principals who can best determine what our students need.

So, following the money, the $330 Million was split between two assessment organizations, Smarter Balance (SBAC) and PARCC. Utah's State Office of Education has elected to be involved with the Smarter Balance Consortium. I am mostly unfamiliar with them, but I was able to attend a conference where the researcher for Smarter Balance, Linda Darling-Hammond, spoke. I attended her lectures for the express purpose of getting more information on her, her perspectives, and the Common Core. (I will post that information in a subsequent blog.) Ms. Darling-Hammond was rumored to be on the short list for US Secretary of Education, but declined due to a new Policy Center opportunity "that will examine a variety of education redesign issues, including standards and assessments". Could she have meant the Common Core? In the meantime, I'd like to issue a call to action for you to find out what you can about these two consortia and their assessment philosophy.

A concern I found on the web states:

Both consortia appear poised to develop subjective assessments rather than objective tests. SBAC plans to assess deep disciplinary understanding and higher-order thinking skills. Will either PARCC or SBAC test student content knowledge and skill?

Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, said:

As I travel around the country the number one complaint I hear from teachers is that state bubble tests pressure teachers to teach to a test that doesn't measure what really matters... Both of these winning applicants are planning to develop assessments that will move us far beyond this and measure real student knowledge and skills.

The issue isn't the bubble tests, it's what is actually assessed, and what teachers will be teaching their students to help them achieve favorable results on these tests.

Recently, I received some communication from parents who are concerned with the Common Core. The concerns come down to two issues. 1) This is brand new. Textbooks haven't been created. Tests haven't been created. No one has done this before, and yet, we are jumping in with both feet across the nation. 2) The whole idea of local control is gone. These standards were created with no public input. They were adopted by states, without public input. And the local school districts must implement the Common Core, without public input.

These concerns were similarly reflected in the above-referenced article:

The CCSS [Common Core] represents a massive unevaluated experiment with our students for which they and their parents have been ill informed and have had no opportunity for input. The CCSS are untested and unevaluated in the classroom. The proposed CCSS should undergo rigorous testing in a limited number of districts before adoption and implementation statewide or nationwide.

And

Adopting the CCSS takes control of educational content and standards away from parents, taxpayers, local school districts, and states. The CCSS were produced by a closed group and conditionally approved by many states without public review. The NGA and CCSSO, both non-government groups, own the copyright protected CCSS. Control over changes to the CCSS will lie in the hands of so called “experts” outside local school district, state, and the federal government jurisdiction. [emphasis in the original]

Public education is a state responsibility. It is not the responsibility of the federal government. States should not turn over their rights or responsibilities to the direction and influence of non-government organizations or the federal government. [emphasis mine]

I am not opposed to the Common Core standards, per se. But I am opposed to such a lack of local control. Given the Common Core, it seems unnecessary to have local school boards other than to allocate the funds for a pre-determined project.

However, I can't emphasize the following point enough. I am SO appreciative to our district administration for delaying implementation of the Common Core for a year. I think it is a difficult line they walk when there is a top-down mandate and our kids' education hangs in the balance. I only wish we could delay it further. Unfortunately, that would require a change in standards and implementation goals from the Utah State Office of Education or State School Board policy.

In conclusion, please find out all you can about Smarter Balance and PARCC, and the US Department of Education's investment in the assessment plans. Also, I would welcome any thoughts on how to delay the implementation further than the one year we are allowed by the State Office of Education.

USBA Convention 2011, Part 1: Open Meetings and USBA

2011-04-18T07:20:00.002-06:00

NOTE: Jan. 6-8, 2011, the Utah School Boards Association held it annual convention. I will update you with multiple blogs on this convention. The convention was held at the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City. Board members were allowed to stay over the two nights at the hotel, but I decided to commute to and from.

USBA Convention 2011, Post 1

USBA Business Session, Friday, Jan. 7, 2011

Nominations were taken for the 2nd Vice President of the USBA. The way it works is that members vote for 2nd VP. There are also a 1st VP and a President (and a past president). After 4 years (I think), the President's term is filled and the 1st VP takes the President's place, the 2nd VP takes the 1st VP's place, and another vote for 2nd VP is held. The 2nd VP, Peggy Jo Kennett, was unopposed. In her remarks she listed four reasons for public education:

Protect Freedom
Develop a sense of community
Create a civic dialog
Keep the poorest from being manipulated and the richest from being lazy

Also, we were told only 25% of the operating funds for USBA are taken from dues (paid, at least in ASD, by the taxpayers). The remaining 75% are for programs, e.g. the New Board Member workshop, and services that USBA provides to its members.

We, then, broke into regions to elect delegates to the USBA Board of Directors and Delegates at Large. Since ASD forms the entire region, our regional director is John Burton. Debbie Taylor and Paula Hill are delegate-at-large and the alternate delegate, respectively.

Class 1: Immigration Law

The immigration law class had a presentation by Utah Senator Luz Robles and Utah Representative Stephen Sandstrom. Both Sen. Robles and Rep. Sandstrom had immigration bills that were addressed in the legislative session.

Class 2: Open Meetings

State Law requires that board members take an Open Meeting class annually. This course satisfied that requirement. It was taught by Brinton Burbidge (of Burbidge & White, LLC--ASD's attorneys).

Essentially, a public meeting is convened by the board president, appropriate notification (at least 24 hours) is given for non-emergency meetings, and a simple majority (4 of our 7) of the board must be present to conduct business. Electronic meetings are acceptable, but there must be some location publicized where the public is able to go and monitor the meeting. (Interestingly, a Massachusetts court case has ruled that an exchange of email among all the board members of a district was a meeting, and violated open meeting laws because no notice was given.) Written minutes and a recording of the meeting must be kept and the recording must be available to the public within 3 business days.

A closed session of a meeting may be held, if 2/3 of those present (and one must always have a quorum) vote in the open session to hold a closed session. The reason and the location for the closed session must be publicly announced (and recorded), as well as the vote, by name, of each board member on the closed session. Closed session may be held for one or more of the following reasons:

Discussion of the character, professional competence, or health of an individual
Strategy sessions to discuss collective bargaining
Strategy sessions to discuss pending or reasonably imminent litigation
Strategy sessions to discuss the purchase, exchange or lease of real property when public discussion would disclose the value of the property or prevent the board from completing the transaction on the best possible terms
Strategy sessions to discuss the sale of real property when a) see above section on value b) board has previously given notice of the sale, and c) the terms of the sale are publicly disclosed prior to board approval of the sale
Discussion of deployment of security personnel, devices, or systems
Investigative proceedings regarding allegations of criminal conduct

Recordings must be kept of the closed session, except if the meeting is held to discuss the character, etc. of an individual or deployment of security personnel or devices. However, the presiding officer must sign a sworn statement affirming that this was the sole purpose of the closed meeting.

To see Utah Law, click here. Utah also has a public notice website, where all public meetings should be listed. You can subscribe on that website to receive notifications of meetings that interest you.

My Take: Public Meetings
Since this class is required by law, I found it especially beneficial. Mr. Burbidge, the instructor, joked that his classes are always well-attended...because they are mandatory. I saw why certain things were done in our closed session meetings and feel that I will be able to uphold the law much better with this new information. In one of my previous posts, someone asked about the ability to obtain the recording of the closed session. During our class, Mr. Burbridge said that those closed session recordings would be available only to a court of law or to a judge. So far, I think our school board is following the open meeting law procedures correctly. I now understand why our Board President has had to refocus board members back on topic during a closed session when our discussion strayed off-track. This is precisely her responsibility and she must sign a legal statement guaranteeing our proper conduct. Now that I am properly informed, I will be better able to support her in that endeavor.

Follow up note:
Another thing I have noticed is how agenda items are classified. I need to do some more research on Robert's Rules--so any of you parliamentarians, please comment and educate me. As I understand it, action items require a motion to take some form of action. After the motion and a second, then there can be discussion. Discussion items are available to discuss free from motions or any other real constraints. However, it is required that items be classified so the public knows which items will be voted on and which will not. I have also seen Discussion with Possible Action items before. The final classification is something called a 'Consent Agenda'. These are a group of items that are mostly routine and don't often require debate or discussion or that have had debate or discussion previously.

April 19, 2011 Agenda

2011-04-16T14:42:00.000-06:00

This meeting has a lot of information in it that has great impact: the Capital Budget, the Vineyard TEC appointment, internet acceptable use policy, etc.

LAKERIDGE JUNIOR HIGH

951 SOUTH 400 WEST

OREM

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to
(1) review the 2011-2012 Maintenance & Operation budget,
(2) review the patron survey results regarding the potential bond in November 2011, and
(3) debrief from the National School Board Convention.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
REVERENCE

STUDENT RECOGNITIONS

ALPINE FOUNDATION RECOGNITIONS

PRINCIPAL, PTA AND SCHOOL

COMMUNITY COUNCIL REPORTS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS

MINUTES

CLAIMS MARCH
ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

2. Personnel Reports

3. Alpine Foundation Report
4. Student Releases - CA, CB, RB, JB, KB, AC
MD, NF, JF, SG, CG, MH, CH, JH, KH, JI, PJ

TJ, ZK DL, TL, TL, PL, SL, BM, TM, AM, BM

BP, JP, DR, UR, FS, BS, SS, KT, KV, JW, BW, SY

5. Student Expulsions - PC, SS

6. Student Reinstatements - DL, TL, TT

ACTION ITEMS

1. Adoption of Tentative 2011-2012 Capital Outlay Budget

2. Acceptable Use Policy

3. 2011-2012 School Fees

4. Student Excursions

A. Lehi High (1)

B. Lone Peak High (3)

C. Mountain View High (2)

D. Orem High (2)

E. Pleasant Grove High (2)

F. Timpanogos High (3)

G. Westlake High (1)

5. Building Rental Request from Christ Evangelical Church

6. Resolution 2011-001 – OPEB Trustees

7. Resolution 2011-002 – Taxing Entity Committee

DISCUSSION ITEMS

1. Resolution 2011-003 – Dissolution of ATEC Fund

2. Resolution 2011-004 – Investment Changes

3. Resolution 2011-005 – Fund Balance

REPORTS

1. Membership Report Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S Debbie Taylor, Board President

INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

District Redistricting, Budget, and Prime Rib

2011-04-08T10:11:00.004-06:00

School District Redistricting

UPDATE NOTE: The County Elections Office will draw the boundaries, but the County Commissioners will need to approve the boundaries. If the district's boundaries did not cross city lines, the city would be responsible for the redistricting.

I had a call from a constituent who was concerned about the board's input into the redistricting process. The concern had to do with the current structure with so much board representation being in Orem. The redistricting is supposed to be fairly uniform and contiguous. However, there is a lot of latitude and power associated with redistricting. Do you maintain the individual board members in each of their respective districts, and just make long, convoluted districts? Or do you simply try to make so many miles square and let the chips fall where they may? Following the growth patterns, the Orem folks will, most likely, lose a representative on the board, making the ratio 2 Orem to 5 others, down from 3 Orem to 4 others. Boards, unlike other representatives' districts are limited in size. More population doesn't equate to more representation, only different representation.

Since school boards are limited to seven members, the current board boundaries need to be shifted to accommodate the greater growth both West and North in our district. Currently, Orem has 3 board members and 1 board member each for PG/Lindon, AF, Alpine/Highland/Cedar Hills/Draper/some Lehi, most Lehi/Eagle Mountain/Saratoga Springs. The County Commissioners (see update note) will redraw the boundaries before June. Should a sitting board member's area be swallowed up into another area, that member will be an 'at large' member and represent the "new" area until their next election. At that next election, it is entirely possible (although the county may try to avoid this) to have 2 incumbent board members running against each other. As a fan of opposition in all things, I think this is a fine scenario.

In reading some articles about other school districts, they are working with their County to help redraw the precinct lines. In asking about our involvement, I was told the County Commission would draw the lines, and then present it to us for our comments.

If you are interested in how your representation will be affected, I recommend you contact the County Commissioners and the Elections Office to discuss this process and to provide your input. I assume, by June, when the boundaries have already been drawn, it may be too late to have any impact. The official boundaries will be set in stone in January 2012. By way of information, two of the three County Commissioners do not live within ASD 's boundaries. Certainly, if you live in the West or the North, you should contact the County Commissioners about what you believe to be fair redistricting. For myself, as close to so many squares as possible would be the ideal. I am tired of gerrymandered districts that make absolutely no sense. Go with population, and leave the incumbents' concerns about reelection to their new constituents.

Budget

I attended the operations budget committee meeting. The district administrators have submitted their requests for budget items that 1) change (usually increase) resources over current allocations or 2) compensate for areas that lost funding from the last legislative session. The committee meeting was meant to be a prioritization meeting. From those priorities, I assume, an actual budget will be proposed. The board will, then, review this proposal, ask questions, and modify it, if necessary. The board must have a final budget approved by June 22 of each year. The budget will not include potential bond amounts and/or projects, since the bond must be approved by the voters.

Two items of interest.

First, there is a portion of property tax, levied by ASD, that is, by law, sent to the charter schools. This was interesting to me because when I was involved with a charter school, there was no property tax component to the funding. In speaking with my State Rep, charter school funding seems to change from legislative session to legislative session. As it stands, 25% of the property tax allocated per student going to a charter schools is given to their respective charter schools. The caveat is that the charter enrollment information comes from two years prior to the current year. The question I have is how do new charter schools get funding, and what if a charter school's enrollment increases or decreases significantly in that 2-year time frame? I need to find out why the lag in data projections. Also, the concern from the district is two-fold. 1) This year it will amount to over $1M (last year and the year before, the amounts were $850K and $950K roughly) and 2) the board are the people who must appear before the taxpayers during the truth in taxation hearings to account for any increases in property tax.

Second, due to the Obamacare mandates in health insurance, our district's health insurance premiums will increase by about $3M this next year. In addition, because employees can now opt to cover their dependent children (married on not, but not spouses and their children) to age 26, there is an estimated $854,000 in additional premiums for those dependents.

The capital budget will appear on the April 19 board meeting agenda, and the operations budget, I assume, will be on the May agenda. Even though, a truth in taxation hearing may occur in August/September should the board approve a tax rate increase, the time to give input on the budget is now through June. It's kind of a backwards process where you put together a budget and approve it (and start using it on July 1, if I understand correctly), but ask for feedback from the people in August. By August, it's too late. I look forward to your input on the budget over the next two months.

Prime Rib (aka ESP Association Dinner)

The term ESP doesn't mean what you think it means in this context. ESP stands for Education Support Professionals. In the district, there are 3 employee associations: teachers (Alpine Education Association), administration (don't know the name of that one), and ESP (formerly called classified employees). The ESP's are all the non-teachers in the district. Within the association, there are different groups who elect their own officers to represent their interests to the ESP officers as a whole. For example, some of the groups are: Food Services, Transportation, Custodial Staff, Secretaries, Nursing, and Media Specialists. The dinner was hosted by the ESP officers and the group presidents. The board and district cabinet members were invited to attend. It was strictly for the purpose of getting to know each other. Under Utah Law, the district must negotiate collective bargaining with any association that has a majority membership among the employee group. See the Utah Code here.

Appointing a New Board Member

2011-03-30T13:55:00.002-06:00

On Tuesday, March 29, the board interviewed the fourteen school board candidates for District 4. I was impressed with the credentials and the comments of each of the candidates. On one hand, it was a hard decision because we had such a good group to choose from. On the other, it was easy because you didn't feel like anyone would make a lousy board member. Still, to be asked to select a representative for your fellow citizens is an awesome and daunting task. It is tempting to look for someone who you would work well with, but equally important, is to find someone who you think will represent their constituents. I am grateful that, most of the time, this task is left up to the people, themselves. It is hard to know what qualities and concerns will bear sway in their minds.

After the interviews, the board met in closed session to discuss the character and competence of the candidates. This afternoon, a motion will be made to appoint one of those individuals to the vacant board position. Then, the new board member will be sworn in. I was grateful to hear the thoughts and comments of my fellow board members. My biggest concern was to find someone who seemed to be an average-enough person and could accurately represent the people of District 4. I am pleased with the process so far.

Also this evening, I will be attending a regional meeting for the Utah School Boards Association. Then, next week is the National School Boards Association Convention in San Francisco. Since that is my old stomping ground, I am happy to go back. There's nothing quite like the City by the Bay. (Yes, I'm a Journey fan.) While I love San Francisco, I want to make sure that my time and your resources are used wisely. My plan is to attend as many events as possible this first year, and then evaluate the ROI (Return on Investment) for you, the taxpayers. As always, I look forward to your feedback.

UPDATE: The Board of Education voted to appoint Mark Clement to the District 4 board vacancy. I look forward to working with Dr. Clement and welcome him to the board.

School Community Council Elections

2011-03-28T21:56:00.000-06:00

Applications for School Community Councils (SCC) are taking place now. The SCC's are the "rubber meets the road" for school involvement. Some of the SCC decisions are:

Develop a school improvement plan
Develop a school Trust Land plan
Participate in the development of a school-level professional development plan and its implementation
Develop a child access routing plan
Advise the school administration on local school issues
Provide an opportunity for issues of concern in the community to be presented to the school administration.
Review school-wide U-PASS data (not individual data)
Develop a reading achievement plan

If you want to get involved, the SCC is the place to be.

I would be happy to post any information about any of the candidates for SCC positions on this blog. I would like to get as much information out to everyone about these positions. If you know of election information for each school, please let me know.

The only information I have so far is Highland Elementary's application deadline is this Friday, April 1, 2011.

Vineyard URA, Bond, New School Names, New Board Member 3/22/11 Meeting

2011-03-25T17:35:00.001-06:00

Vineyard URA Update

On March 23, 2011, the Vineyard URA held a public input meeting. Legal Counsel for the Alpine School District read a statement at that meeting. Board members were advised to allow legal counsel to attend and speak on their behalf. I appreciate all of you who attended the hearing, who wrote letters, and shared the information with your friends and neighbors. I will keep you updated as things progress. To read and view the Fox13 report, please go here. This hearing begins the official 30-day window for appeal of the URA, according to the report.

March 22, 2011 Work Session and Board Meeting at Cedar Ridge Elementary School

Work Session

Bond Update

The board received a list of the suggested projects for the bond. At this time, this list is just a DRAFT. Public and Employee meetings will be held in April and May to receive feedback on the bond, itself, as well as the suggested projects.

One of the concerns has been Lehi High, which is over 50 years old. The board investigated purchasing property near where the high school is currently located, building a brand new high school on the new property and selling the old Lehi High buildings and property. My understanding was this was a preferred option for the City of Lehi. Unfortunately, the current site could not be sold for anywhere near enough to make this plan financially feasible. So, the current plan is to start on Phase II (there is a master plan for all the major construction projects in the district and this plan will be available at the Public bond input meetings) for rebuilding part of Lehi High on its current location. However, this will all depend on the public feedback.

Please attend one of the meetings and help get the word out to those who do not have children in ASD. All of the PTA/SCC meetings and the public input meetings are open to the everyone. The presentation will be the same. You may choose whichever meeting is most convenient for you. For a list of those meetings, please go here.

Capital Budget Meeting

Last week, I attended the Capital (anything with a "useful life" greater than one year) Budget Meeting, which was reviewed during the work session. This is the PROPOSED budget, but hasn't been approved by the board at this time. As I mention the budget in this context, bear in mind this is the proposed budget, but I will omit the modifier 'proposed' for the rest of this discussion.

A few items of interest. First, all of the district's bonds are done over 15-years. It saves much in interest (just like a 15-year home mortgage does). Also, the district staggers its debt so we repay all of a particular group of bonds by the time we start another set of bonding. This way, we keep our debt repayment amount mostly constant, instead of increasing it. We will be paying $33M in principal and $15M in interest this year.

There is a budget for remodeling/upgrading existing facilities. This year it is set for $4M. The physical facilities department has a 10-year plan of items that need to be addressed, including the seismic issues discussed in previous posts. This plan is prioritized, and some of the schools that appear on this list will not be included in the bond projects, as the amounts are either small enough to included here or the need is so great that it must be done right away. There are $3M worth of specific remodel/upgrade (non-bond) projects for this coming fiscal year. In addition, $1M is set aside in various 'emergency' accounts, such as roofing, boiler, etc to accommodate unforeseen expenditures that crop up during the year. An example of this was over Thanksgiving, a fire alarm panel malfunctioned, calling the fire department 6 times in a matter of days. The funds for its replacement were taken from these 'emergency' funds called control accounts. If there is any money left over in these accounts at the end of the fiscal year (and their is usually only some change), it reverts to the general capital fund and must be reallocated by the board the next year. The Capital Fund balance (i.e. left over savings from the previous budget) has no legal limit on it; whereas, the general fund does have a legal limit.

Computer Rotation: The district policy is for teachers to receive new computers every four years. It used to be done every three years, as the computers come with three-year warranties. It has been found to be more economical to go for four years, and allocate some money for repairs that fourth year. Also, as technology changes, this allows us to keep up with technological advancements. So, one-fourth of the teachers get a new computer this year.

There is also an allocation to upgrade networking equipment, and an amount for tech support.

Last year, there were no new buses purchased. This year, the plan is to purchase 2 special ed buses, and 6 regular ed buses. Also, it is recommend that we spend $60,000 to install a new fuel tank at the bus depot. This will save us $.20/gal or about $200,000 this coming year.

Finally, there is a budget item for instruction. This would be for things like classroom furniture. There is a set amount per school, and then so much per student.

This budget will be on the agenda for tentative adoption in April. The board, by law, must approve a budget by June 22 of each year. However, if we adopt the capital budget in April, the district will be able to order supplies and get construction contracts right away. This way, these projects will be ready to begin as soon as school lets out for the summer.

Legislation

Rob Smith and JoDee Sundberg were instrumental in giving information to our legislators on how HB2 (the main appropriations bill) would impact schools, in general, and our district in particular. There were quite a few good things that occurred because of this, and for that, we are appreciative. One thing that may have some unintended consequences is that students that are enrolled in ASD and MATC (Mountainland Applied Technology Center) will now only generate funding for EITHER ASD or MATC, not both. Until now, the schools in the district have tried to consolidate class offerings with MATC, so there is not duplication of resources. If the schools are to lose money by sending their students off to MATC, there is incentive to duplicate those classes at the high schools.

The State Office of Education will be putting together a booklet of all the new education legislation and list what the State Office will need to do to accommodate the legislation and what the local districts will be required to do as well. One of the issues is if a teacher has a child at a school in the district, that teacher is not allowed to serve on his/her child's school's SCC as a parent. The teacher may still serve at their school of employment as a teacher rep on the SCC.

Board Meeting

Cedar Ridge Recognitions and Reports

Cedar Ridge Elementary recognized 8 students. The Alpine Foundation also recognized 2 teachers, 2 support personnel, and 2 volunteers. We heard reports from the SCC, PTA, and Principal Bruner. The principal was going to be spending the next day on the roof of the school, as the prize for additional math practice. Good thing the weather was nice (as opposed to the rain/snow we are having as I type this).

New School Names

The two new schools in Saratoga Springs, along with the Special Ed school attached to the South School were named. The North School is Riverview Elementary School. The South School is Thunder Ridge Elementary School. The Special Ed School is Horizon School.

Elementary Schools Report

The four district administrators, supervising the elementary schools, provided a report to the board of the 50+ elementary schools in the district, along with basic information, the Math and Language Arts CRT scores, and the UPASS scores.

Board Reports

The Curriculum Committee discussed Common Core, ASD's online school for home schoolers, and the preschool program.

Four board members attended the Leadership Conference, sponsored by BYU's CITES department. A keynote speaker at the conference said, "We need to teach learners how to learn." Also, the technology presentations were very good. I would have liked to have seen more emphasis on the role of parents in their children's education. I will have a more in-depth blog post on this conference in a few days.

Open Board Member Position

There are FOURTEEN candidates for the open board position. We will be interviewing all of them on Tuesday, March 29 from 1pm - ????. This meeting is open to the public. Each candidate will have 15 minutes: an opening statement, 2 questions, and a closing statement. The two questions will be the same for each candidate. The board spent some time discussing those questions and how best to determine who should have the position. One of the main concerns is that, despite differences, the board members are able to discuss and maintain a level of trust among each other. I brought up the idea that we need to keep in mind that we are trying to find someone to represent the voters of the PG/Lindon area, not just someone we can get along with. It's important to keep that in mind.

The two questions are:
1. We have read through the information you have submitted highlighting your experiences and qualities. How would you use these to contribute to and strengthen our Board?
2. As Board members we are advocates for Alpine School District, public education and for all children. How do you see yourself in this role?
The candidates are:

Julie Adamic
Bruce Armstrong
Mark Bezzant
Mark Bishop
Mark Clement
Karie Cooper
Niels Fugal
Stephen Graham
David Holdaway
Jeremy Hurren
Linda Nelson
John Olsen
Stephen Swenson
Paul Wangemann

After the interviews, the board will convene in a closed session to discuss the character and competence of the candidates. The board will then reconvene on Wednesday, March 30 at 4pm to vote on which candidate should have the open position. After the vote, the new board member will receive the oath of office.

Mar. 8, 2011 Board Meeting

2011-03-09T23:08:00.000-07:00

Work Session

Note: Work Sessions are held at 4pm, prior to each board meeting. Work Sessions are open to the public.

Bond projects

A draft of the bond projects was discussed. The 4 proposed elementary schools and 1 junior high will be built using plans of existing schools. The major proposed renovations are to AF, PG, and Lehi High, as those schools were built in the 50's. There was a 4-phase plan established prior to the previous bond for each of these (and some other) schools. It is proposed that these schools will have Phase II of that plan implemented under this bond. Additionally, ASD had an engineering firm perform a seismic study of each of the school several years ago. The plan is to address those seismic needs for those schools that have the highest priority in these areas. As always, these things are subject to change, based on feedback from the public and the amount of the bond.

Board Member Interview Questions

The board reviewed the procedure and four interview questions from the last board appointment. I had a couple of suggested changes.
1) Have the board candidate define their view of what their role as a board member is prior to describing how their experience would assist them in their role on the board.
2) Discuss the guiding principles they will use in making decisions on the board.
After some discussion, it was decided that the existing questions would be used for the candidate interviews. Each candidate will receive the questions and the format, as well as the Board's Code of Conduct (revised 1/31/11) prior to the interview.

The questions are:
1. What qualities do you possess to be a good board member? How would these qualities strengthen our board?
2.Can you share a past experience working with a team and building consensus?
3. How will previous leadership experiences help you in your role as a school board member?
4. As Board members, we are advocates for public education, for Alpine School District, and for all children. How do you see yourself in this role?

The deadline for filing a letter of intent and a resume for the board position is March 18.

Board Meeting

Recognitions

This was board member, Guy Fugal's last board meeting. There were several presentations for him, and he and his wife (and former principal), Paula, bestowed a scholarship check for $50,000 for Educational Support Service Employees to be able to continue with their personal education. He also spent his last day serving lunch at a school. Guy and his wife will be serving an LDS Mission in London. I wish them all the best!

Claims and Routine Business

I am still struggling with the claims. I feel in order to approve something, I must have more knowledge of each item, and not just the overall process. If I just skim the 200 pages of claims, is that sufficient? What if I only partially understand what was paid for and why? Utah Code says the Business Administrator must present the claims and budget report to the board monthly. I am working to get greater clarification. In the meantime, I will continue to abstain from the approval of the claims.

School Names

Three names for each of the two new elementary schools in Saratoga Springs were proposed. The top recommendations were Thunder Ridge and Riverview. The board will vote on the formal names at a subsequent board meeting.

Internet Policy/Fee Schedule

The new procedure is for the board-approved policies to be high-level and general. The rules, regulations and procedures will contain the specifics. This allows the administration to modify, as necessary, the nuts and bolts of a procedure without having to go back to the board, as long as it follows the overall policy set forth by the board. I think this makes sense. As we get phones, and iPads, and so forth being used at school, it would be good for the schools/district to adjust things slightly to comply with the overall policy of using the internet for education purposes and preventing offensive, criminal, etc content. Each parent will need to sign an internet policy information sheet, and then, MAY, opt their child in. The consent form will be valid throughout elementary school, but a new one will be signed for middle/junior high school, and then again in high school. See the information here.

Also, the maximum amount that schools/classes could charge for fees was presented. The board will approve this fee schedule in a subsequent board meeting.

Audit Committee

I attended the audit committee (which meets only twice a year). We reviewed the audit schedule for the 22 schools (abt. 1/3 of the schools) for this year, and decided we would review the results of the audit in the fall. We met with our two auditors from Squire. Squire has a policy to not assign the same auditors to the same institutions year after year, but to rotate, both to give us people with varied experience as well as to maintain a level of objectivity. The district also went out to bid for an auditor a while back for the same reason (objectivity), and also to verify pricing. I felt comfortable with the plan and the information presented. We also discussed new audit standards the board will need to adopt, as required by the State Office of Education.

Other Events

Traverse Mountain SCC

I was honored to attend the Traverse Mountain Elementary School Community Council. They have a good group who want to be informed. They are rotating members to attend the board meetings, so they can stay informed. (They also have members who read this blog. Thank you for that!) They will be combining with their PTA's Facebook page and blog. The school also has a nice and informative website. I was pleased to see the level of involvement.

CITES Leadership Conference

I will be attending the CITES Leadership Conference March 10 -11 (tomorrow and Friday), sponsored by the BYU-Public School Partnership. I am interested to see the benefit of the partnership up close and personal. Also, one of the featured speakers, Linda Darling-Hammond, is involved with SBAC and West Ed, which will be developing the assessments for the Common Core Standards.

Vineyard URA

A public hearing on the URA will be held on March 23, at 7pm at the Vineyard City Offices. If you haven't contacted the county commissioners about your position on this URA, I ask you to do so prior to March 23. I would also recommend that you attend the meeting on the 23rd. For those of you who need to come up to speed on the URA, click here. In short, the URA allows a developer to forego paying taxes to ASD, City, County, and Miscellaneous taxing entities for 35 years (estimated amount $300M), and to use that money for the clean-up and development of the former Geneva Steel site. Alpine School District voted against this proposal, something that I couldn't agree with more.

Bond Survey Discussion

2011-03-02T14:11:00.000-07:00

The Daily Herald published an article on the district's bond survey. In light of a few questions that have been surfacing, I felt I should put some concerns to rest.

First, the district is hiring an independent polling firm to conduct the survey. Some people thought the district, itself, was going door-to-door. This is incorrect. The polling firm will be doing the door-to-door interviews. The survey consists of quite a few questions, all of which the board has discussed in work sessions. The bond questions have yet to be completely finalized, but will be before mid-March. For my previous coverage of the bond survey, please see here, here, and here. The cost to hire this firm is roughly $8000 and will survey approximately 800 residents of ASD.

This brings me to the next point. The Herald article says that residents of North Utah County will be surveyed. By this statement, it doesn't mean some of ASD but not all of ASD. All areas covered by ASD residents will be proportionately surveyed. Again, by a reputable firm. This firm has done bond surveys for the district for the past two bonds. The only difference this time is it will be done door-to-door instead of over the phone. There is no additional cost to the district (and hence, to you, the taxpayers) for a door-to-door survey instead of the phone survey.

Admittedly, surveys exist to get information, but also to provide information. This survey is no exception. Details of the district and the bond will be provided. Some options, in the place of a bond, are provided for your feedback. The question I would ask you is, with a proposed 10,000 additional students entering the district in the next 5 years, how do we accommodate that growth?

One of the suggestions is to build smaller schools or schools with less amenities. The concern is why should the people out west have less "school" or less amenities than those in the east. The flip side is if we are unable to provide that level of building, due to the economy, we need to tighten our belts just like everyone else.

Another suggestion is to utilize more online offerings and perhaps a greater mix of work done at home and less at school (allowing for a shorter school day). Also can we allow more flexibility in what courses, outside of school, can be counted for school credit? As an example, my kids take private music lessons. Can those lessons count for music credit at the school? If not, why not?

A third suggestion was to operate the schools in a fashion like the colleges and universities, as a trimester system. The only way this would work is if both the faculty and the students/parents were able to choose their attendance schedule. For example, there would be Fall, Winter, and Summer trimesters. You get to pick 2 out of 3 to attend. One advantage to Summer term would probably be smaller class sizes (as well as for those who ski and snowboard). Additionally, if a student chose to go year round and finish sooner, why not? The advantage is full use of our existing buildings.

All of the above options have pros and cons associated with them. I throw them out for your discussion. I would also like to hear of any other options you would consider.

In short, the way we have always done things is, as more kids enter the system, we bond to build more schools. If we want to alter that course of action, we need to solve the problem of educating those additional students in a new way. I look forward to reading your input.

Feb. 22, 2011 Board Meeting

2011-02-24T20:49:00.001-07:00

Work Session

Bond Survey
The schedule for the Bond Survey and meetings on the bond was discussed. Please see the notes from the Feb. 8 board meeting for the schedule. Please be aware that the Public Input Meetings AND the PTA/SCC Cluster Meetings are open to the public. The information presented will be the same, so choose whichever one works the best. The results from the bond survey will be available on April 18 and will be presented to the board at the April 19 board meeting.

Claims and Account Information
Our Business Officer, Rob Smith, spent the rest of the work session reviewing the account codes used on the claims report, discussing the budget, and how the monthly claims and budget reports work. I found this MOST helpful.

Account Codes:
The Account codes are made up of five parts, separated by periods. Most of the account codes are structured according to the State Office of Education's recommendations, in conjunction with the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). The goal of these account codes is to allow consistent, measurable reporting. The account code structure is as follows.

Function--4 digits
Object--4 digits
Program--4 digits
Fund--2 digits
Location--3 digits

For example, the 1000 function deals with instruction. So, a report, listing all account items with with function yields a total cost of instruction. The object code of 0100-0199 is for salary. So, to see all instructional salaries, you would look for 1000.0100... - 1000.0199... items. To see instructional salaries for special ed (program code 1200-1299), it would be 1000.0100.1200... - 1000.0199.1299.... and so forth. To see a list of the account code definitions, please go here.

ClaimsThe claims are an accounting of expenses, after the fact. They are the verification of the budget process set in June. (See below.) Some items to look for in reviewing the claims are as follows.

1. Large or infrequent claims: Last board meeting, I had inquired about a large payment to AF Hospital. The fund code associated with that transaction was 60 which is for Workman's Compensation. ASD self-insures for Workman's Comp. So, whenever there is a claim, the district pays the provider from the 60 fund.

2. US Bank: ASD uses purchase cards for purchasing in order to simplify the process. Last month, I noticed a very large sum associated with a single individual. This individual is the district's main purchasing person.

3.8100.007 accounts are school reimbursement accounts. Each school has its own budget. However, to facilitate transactions, many items are paid for through the district, and then reimbursed by the school.

Every expenditure/receipt must be reviewed and approved by the individual's immediate supervisor. As amounts of expenses go up, there is a hierarchy of who must approve those expenses.

Monthly Budget Report
The budget report tracks revenue and expenses from the budget and provides any adjustments (i.e. a new grant, reductions in state revenue) to the budget. If you look at the percentage spent, it is helpful to see how close the budget is.

Budget Process
Every year, the board creates a budget (by June 22) for the coming fiscal year which starts on July 1. If you think of the idea of using envelopes for each budget item, the board decides how much money will go in each envelope (budget area). A final budget for the current year (ending June 30), is also adopted by June 22. The board may, as needed, adjust the budget, during the year by official board action.

By law, the claims and the budget report are provided to the board, monthly, for on-going verification of the budget process.

Board Meeting

Students and teachers of Fox Hollow Elementary were recognized, and reports from the PTA, SCC, and the principal were given. I appreciated the PTA president saying they were utilizing email and facebook to communicate with parents.

There were no community comments, so we went to the board committee reports. There has been some clarification on this issue.

Policy Committee
The policy committee is reviewing policies and making them brief and to the point. There are also associated procedures that will contain more detail. There is a new policy on internet usage.

Technology Committee
The district is close to capacity on its wireless network structure. Interestingly, the measurements are taken right after Christmas, when everyone comes back with their new gadgets. It is projected that in a year, the network will be maxed out. There are two issues with wireless at the schools and district office. First, there is the physical bandwidth component. At some point, there is a limit on how many devices can be connected to the wireless network. Also, there is a financial component for every device accessing the internet. (It comes to approximately $70/year.) Since students, parents, teachers, and other visitors may access the internet via the district's network at each of our schools there is a discussion about how to handle both of these components.

Legislative Committee
There are more education bills before the legislature this year than ever before.

PR Committee--BYU-PSP Leadership Associates Meeting
The PR Committee attended the BYU-PSP Leadership Associates Meeting in St. George in January. Since the partnership has disassociated itself from the National Network for Education Renewal (NNER), the meeting was conducted to discuss the mission and values of the partnership, as a separate entity from NNER. There was quite a bit of discussion and is an on-going process. However, it was agreed that the values were good values and all were contained in the Utah Constitution.

My comment: I was pleased with the break from the NNER. I thought the partnership group could and should establish their direction, using our shared goals and values without looking to an outside group for our inspiration.

PR Committee
ASD is getting a new website. It is more streamlined and user-friendly. I am pleased to be on this committee to review this process. We are hopeful the new website will be launched by the beginning of April.

North Utah County Medical Coalition
I represent the board on this medical coalition. It is a collection of representatives from the district, and several health-related agencies in the county (e.g. Wasatch Mental Health, Nurses' Association, Utah County Health Department, BYU Comprehensive Clinic). We had a presentation from Kids on the Move about their Early Intervention (home visits, library resources) and Early Head Start (weekly in-home visits dealing with health habits, etc) programs. There is also a Day Care program, specializing in irregular hours. Finally, we heard from the director of the "Bridges" autistic program. There are many people who are unable to get into the Giant Steps program for autism and "Bridges" is a good alternative. The final part of the coalition meeting is for those to discuss what needs and/or resources they have, and see if someone else may be able to help or use those resources.

Community Comments Format
The board has adopted a new format for community comments, as follows.
1. Total time limit of 30 minutes, per meeting.
2. Sign up before the meeting.
3. Time limited to 3 minutes/person.
4. No sharing of the 3 minute period.
5. Follow-up with a district staff member.
6. If a group attends, a representative from that group will be given 5 minutes.
7. We may ask for the group to raise their hands to get to know how many share that issue.
8. If a large group needs more time, we may arrange a time for them to meeting with district officials and a few board members.

Board Member Resignation
Board Member, Guy Fugal, has tendered his resignation, effective March 9, 2011. He and his wife will be serving a mission for the LDS Church in London. I am grateful for the association I have had with Guy, his welcoming attitude, and helpful advice.

The board has 30 days from the date of resignation to fill the position.
Feb. 25 - Mar. 18: Posting of the board position.
Mar. 8: The board will agree on the interview questions.
Mar. 22: The board will review the candidates.
Mar. 29: The board will interview the candidates in an open board meeting.
Mar. 30: A special board meeting will be held to announce the appointment.

Feb. 8, 2011 Work Session and Board Meeting

2011-02-23T21:57:00.001-07:00

IMPORTANT UPDATE On Vineyard URA:
A public meeting will be held March 23 at 7pm at the Vineyard City Offices (see notice here) on the URA. I urge all who are interested to attend. Also, if you haven't contacted the County Commissioners to express your opinion on revisiting the terms of the URA, please do so. And, please thank the State School Board for their direction to reassess the terms of this URA.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled program....

Work Session

Bond Survey
The bond survey questions were reviewed and tweaked. The board decided to use the full population to determine the survey sample, as opposed to the number of kids in the schools in given areas. There will be a 35 - 40 person test run, to make sure the questions make sense. Here are some dates for the bond discussion.

April 6
12:00 pm Mayor's Lunch (all mayors from our area will be invited to meet and discuss the bond with the board)

PTA/SCC Cluster Meetings
All PTA and SCC (school community council) members from all the schools that feed into the high school listed. I assume, since these are SCC meetings, they are open to the public.

American Fork: April 20 1:00 - 2:00 pm
Lehi: April 20 1:00 - 2:00 pm
Pleasant Grove: April 22 10:00 - 11:00 am
Orem: April 22 10:00 - 11:00 am
Lone Peak: April 26 10:00 - 11:00 am
Mountain View: April 26 10:00 - 11:00 am
Westlake: April 28 10:00 - 11:00 am
Timpanogos: April 28 10:00 - 11:00 am

Employee Input Meetings
Orem JH: April 20 3:00 and 4:00 pm
Vista Heights Middle: April 21 3:00 and 4:00 pm
Mountain Ridge JH: April 26 3:00 and 4:00 pm

Community Input Meetings
Mountain View HS: May 4 7:00 pm
Willowcreek: May 11 7:00 pm
American Fork JH: May 12 7:00 pm

BYU-PSP and UVU K-16 Alliance

UVU Alliance: This partnership has been in place for about 1.5 years. It is made up of the UVU College of Ed and the Superintendents of the 7 local districts that make up the state's UVU region. (The state is divided into Higher Ed regions, with those school districts that geographically match to a Higher Ed school.) This relationship has been encouraged on a state level from the State Office of Ed, the Board of Regents and the Commissioner of Higher Ed. The challenge for the alliance is to create a smooth transition from high school to college. A key component of this is to help counselors. In order to do this, there has been a counselor conference. They are also looking at math, transitioning high school to college math, and concurrent enrollment in math.

BYU-PSP: This has been going on for 26 years. It comprises the Dean of the College of Ed and the superintendents of the 5 partners school districts (ASD, Nebo, Provo, Jordan, and Wasatch) as the governing board. CITES (Center for Improvement of Teacher Education and Schooling) is the operational arm of the partnership. Steve Baugh is the director of CITES and the executive director of the partnership. The concept is that to have good schools, you must have good teachers. So, the people who are studying to be teachers (pre-service), as well as the district teachers (in-service) can benefit from training, research, and certification coordinated between the districts and BYU. Also, things like Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are taught at BYU and UVU. This allows new teachers (of which ASD has quite a few every year) to hit the ground running.

Funding: One of the school districts is the fiscal agent of the partnership. That rotates around to different districts. Currently, Jordan is the fiscal agent. Many of the funds come from the districts paying, per participant, for certification courses. Another source of funding comes from conferences. For example, this year, March 9 - 11, there is a CITES conference in Salt Lake on 21st Century Schooling. It has a national presence, and those who attend pay a fee. The people they bring in for the conferences are cutting-edge, high-end, research-based experts. Any profit from the conferences also goes to the partnership.

Finally, research is a huge challenge for teachers. How do you know your methodology is working? Teaming with BYU allows the school to research the methods being used in the schools. Also, some teachers from the districts are able to take a 2-year sabbatical to teach and instruct at the College of Ed, so it's "real world" experience, not just theoretical.

In 2008, about 55% of ASD's teachers came from BYU or UVU (40% BYU, 15% UVU). 2009: 34% BYU, 16% UVU. 2010: 47% BYU, 23% UVU or 70% of ASD new hires come from one of the two partnership schools. The partnerships are not something "extra" the district does. It is part of the district culture and makes us a better district. It continues on because it is viable.

My Take: Partnerships
Everyone is very enthusiastic about the partnerships. I will be attending the CITES-sponsored conference in March to get a hands-on understanding of how the partnership works. I will keep you updated.

Board Meeting

There were 2 recognitions. Teacher, Kim Bahr, received the Karl Jones Award from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Alpine Elementary received the James Oberstar Safe Routes to School Award, a national award.

Sam Jarman, supervisor over the high schools, presented the CRT (state standardized test) results. There are 14 school districts in the Salt Lake and Utah Valley areas that are similar to ASD. ASD ranks 3 of 14 on these tests. Also, our AP class offerings have increased. The use of interactive video has allowed some smaller schools to provide AP classes annually, whereas, they may have only been able to offer those classes every two years in the past. This year, on March 1, all high school juniors (with one school opting out) will be able to take the ACT at no charge because of a state pilot program. It is assumed that ASD's ACT scores may decrease because of the greater number of students taking the test. However, giving more students that opportunity may open up greater avenues to them. Currently, ASD outranks Utah (and Utah outranks the US) in both percentage of students taking the ACT, as well as ACT composite scores.

The board approved January's claims, and routine business items. Only Board Member Fugal abstained on the claims. I was able to receive input on some specific issues I raised on the claims. I would still like to find a better way of handling those claims, but, as one wise person counseled, it isn't fair to prevent district business from taking place because I am not up to speed. Touche. I still appreciate hearing your comments on how best to represent you on this, and other issues.

Closed session was held to discuss personnel, litigation, and property matters.

Feb. 22, 2011 Board Meeting Agenda

2011-02-18T14:44:00.000-07:00

AGENDA . . . TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2011

FOX HOLLOW ELEMENTARY

1450 W. 3200 N.

LEHI

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

A study session will be held prior to the regular board meeting. The purpose of the study session

will be to (1) review the bond survey and finalize the timeline of when the survey will be given;

(2) review the M&O and Capital Outlay budget process; and, (3) review the process for putting

together the monthly Claims report.

BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

AGENDA ITEMS Introduced by

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Paula Hill, Board Member

REVERENCE “

STUDENT RECOGNITIONS “

ALPINE FOUNDATION RECOGNITIONS “

PRINCIPAL, PTA AND SCHOOL “

COMMUNITY COUNCIL REPORTS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS* “

BOARD MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS Paula Hill, Board Member

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

*Time set aside for community comments is not a time to discuss specific personnel issues. Personnel issues are

not appropriate discussion items for an open-meeting environment. If you have a personnel concern, we ask that

you contact a member of the administration or put your concern in writing and address it to the Board of Education.

USBA: Day on the Hill

2011-02-07T15:23:00.000-07:00

I attended the USBA Day on the Hill at the Capitol building today (Jan. 28, 2011). I had wanted to be able to meet with some Senators and Representatives, but it was quite difficult. Note to self: Set up meeting times in advance. Somehow, they are all busy during a 45-day session. Go figure.

USBA has meetings every Friday during the legislative session, along with the Utah School Superintendents Association (USSA) and the Utah Association of School Business Officers (UASBO), to weigh in on current legislation. Each organization selects delegates, and many months prior to the legislative session, they decide on a general direction for the bills they will and will not support. Once the legislature is in session, these combined groups vote on the current bills. It requires 2/3 majority to take a position on a bill. Options are Support, Oppose, Hold (with comment sometimes), Local Control (oppose because this should be an issue of local control), Unnecessary.

Prior to the voting, we were addressed by Lt. Gov. Greg Bell, Christine Kearl (Governor's Education Director), Sen. Lyle Hilyard, Rep. Mel Brown, and Rep. Bird.

Lt. Gov. Bell
Lt. Gov. Bell discussed the compelling stories of both the Israelis and the Palestinians. He said that both stories were compelling. He suggested people have a tendency to tell their own story, and not listen to the other side. He gave some information about the budget situation. Last year, there was a 22% cut in every department of state, 16% cut in Higher Ed, and 12 % cut in Public Ed. He also said the Governor recognizes you don't improve public ed by the legislature lobbing bills into education like bombs from a plane. It won't work because there's no buy-in. On the other hand, he asked us to recognize the new political and fiscal realities, bring concrete examples to the legislature to help them understand, and realize this is the new normal--it isn't going to be like it was.

Christine Kearl
Christine Kearl discussed the Governor's Education Committee. Since I have reviewed this elsewhere, I will just give a brief synopsis with the budget amounts associated with each issue.

The main goal of this committee is to have 66% of Utahns (20 - 64) have a post-secondary certificate or degree by 2020. This is based on a study showing what education will be required of our workforce to continue economic development in our state.

Above all, the Governor is committed to funding growth in our public schools. After that, there are 8 proposals (which passed unanimously) from the Ed Committee.

1.) Optional Extended-Day Kindergarten: $7.5M
2.) Reading Literacy: $2M to Utah State Office of Education (USOE) for this
3.) Common Core State Standards: $2M (USOE)
4.) Assessment Improvements: $1M (USOE)
5.) Mission-Based Funding: Fund higher ed, not on enrollment, but on outcomes, e.g. degrees and completion: $1M
6.) Internal Alignments: Better networking w/ Public, Applied Tech, and Higher Ed: $250K
7.)Utah Cluster Acceleration Program: Higher Ed collaborates with businesses, e.g Weber working with Aerospace Technology: $250K
8.) Online Early College: Concurrent enrollment for high school students to take GE courses:$500K

Gov's Budget:
$215M projected NEW money this year. Governor wants to spend $50M for public education's growth and $13M as listed above. There is a $315M structural imbalance (this means that the budget from last year had $315M more expenses than on-going revenue, e.g. Feds sent one-time money, rainy day funds). Last year's motto was "Do More with Less". This year's is "Do More with the Same".

Sen. Lyle Hilyard
Says there's support for Extended-Day Kindergarten, but discussed the budget figures. The $315M 'structural imbalance' means if we do nothing with our budgets, we are down $315M. Two years ago it was $550M, so the legislature brought it down quite a bit last year. The goal this year is to get it to $0 (from the legislature's perspective. The Gov. wants to use rainy day funds to leave a $200M imbalance going forward.) The $315M imbalance is 7% of the total budget. Each legislative chair is to cut 7% from his/her budget. This doesn't mean that everyone will end up with a 7% cut, but everyone is expected to bring 7% to the table. He also mentioned that education was 50% of the state's budget. If education does not get cut at all, every other entity must double their cuts. He said he receives people in his office describing dire medical situations, e.g. people on life support, who will be cut off without on-going aid from the state. It's a difficult place to be in. He asked that we understand this situation.

Rep. Mel Brown
Discussed the 7% budget cuts across the board, and said the legislature would like to fund growth in education just like the Governor.

Rep. Bird
Discussed the bill to allow school boards to sell bus space for advertisers. There are limitations on where the ads go (e.g. not on the back), and the content (no alcohol, suggestive content, street signs, etc).

Bill Status
Support:
HB50: School Termination Procedure
SB115: School Performance Reporting
HB195: Debt Service Obligations of a Divided District
HB199: Advertisements on School Buses
SB38: K-3 Reading

Oppose:
HB65: Public School Funding
HB72: Taxes and related school funding
SJR1: Joint Resolution on State Board of Education
SJR9: Governance and Public Ed

Local issue/unnecessary:
HB220: Civics Education
HJR3: Joint Resolution promoting healthy and energy efficient schools
HB218: Clubs in Public Schools

Hold:
SB21: Tax Revisions--concerned with loss of revenue
SB119: School District Superintendent Amendment--Ask Sen. Stephenson to propose amending the current language which already allows local districts to hire Superintendent's without an Administrative Education License but not allow the USOE to veto that process. The USOE can still run background checks and provide information to the local board, but can't derail the hiring. Currently, the USOE 'may grant' approval to the school board. If the bill just says 'shall grant' it will accomplish the same things as Sen. Stephenson's bill.

My Take: Bills
I have not found an official link to the list of bills supported, etc. When I do, I will pass it along. I found the process interesting.

I partially disagreed with the vote on SB119. The bill seemed fine to me as written. In fact, the difference is 'as written' the superintendent is not granted a license by the USOE, but may still be hired by the local board. The suggestion by the USBA was to continue to have the USOE grant an admistrative license but withdraw the USOE's veto power in this instance.

HB220 didn't pass because it was deemed unnecessary for local control, mirroring the comments in the committee hearing. I didn't understand from the discussion that this was simply adding a few lines to the existing law, discussing civics education. It was mostly a clarification, and I would definitely support it. Since I am not a delegate, I was unable to vote.

One interesting note, Deputy Supt. Menlove of the USOE said they had difficulty providing a 7% budget cut to the legislature. They decided to suggest a cut to the FlexWPU which is an amount the state provides to local districts to offset their social security and retirement costs (required by law). The unofficial consensus from those of us at ASD was this would have been the last thing we would have suggested. Instead, we would cut specific programs. That's what we do as individuals.

Also, there is a petition to oppose partisan state and local school board elections.

Claims

2011-02-07T15:09:00.000-07:00

I am asking for your help in deciding how to handle claims.

Every month, all the expenditures of the previous month are approved by the board. The full report is listed on the district website, and can be reviewed by the public. (See the section marked 'claims', expand, and download.) This information is usually posted three or four days in advance of the board meeting (2nd Tuesday of each month).

All expenses over a certain dollar amount must be approved by a supervisor. All expenses over $5000 must be approved by the superintendent or the cabinet (those who directly report to the superintendent). All expenses over $10,000 are approved by the board. In addition, the board creates the annual budget, and, as such, determines how much money goes into each fund. If you think of funds as envelopes for budgeting, you'll get the idea. There's a general fund, a capital fund, etc. The capital fund has to be used on things with a useful life (accounting term) of more than one year. Most often, capital items are buildings, furniture, computers, buses, etc. The general fund pays for salaries and day-to-day operating expenses. Also, each school has a budget, and they can spend up to a given amount without going through approval at the district level. Also note, anything listed as account '8100' or 'Pay 8100' is an amount the district paid for on behalf of a given school, and the school is receiving the money for it. For example, some schools have cell towers on their property that allow them to collect money from the cell providers (or whomever). The renters pay ASD, and ASD pays that portion back to the school.

Here's my issue. As a board member, I am approving all the expenditures for the previous month. However, there are so many, it is virtually impossible to see and understand all of them in such a short period of time. If I am accountable for those expenditures, then I feel an obligation to approve each of them. If not, then should I be voting on them? It has been suggested that I look over the list and see what things stick out. What would you do? I would appreciate your help in both reviewing the claims, and recommending how you would like to see this oversight exercised.

Agenda: Feb. 8, 2011 District Office

2011-02-07T14:54:00.000-07:00

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to (1) follow-up on the questions for the bond survey,

(2) review the BYU Public Education Partnership and K-16 Alliance with UVU, and (3) discuss

other current issues.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

AGENDA ITEMS Introduced by

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Debbie Taylor, Board President

REVERENCE “

RECOGNITIONS “

COMMUNITY COMMENTS* “

MINUTES FOR JANUARY “

CLAIMS FOR JANUARY Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

2. Personnel Reports “

3. Alpine Foundation Report “

4. Student Releases – AA, JB, BB, SB, MC, BC, MD

JD, DD, HD, DE, AG, DH, RH, MJ, KJ, CK, TK

ML, PL, TL, EM, MM, NM, CM, LN, MN, SO, MP

BP, BP, AP, SP, ER, AS, LS, DR, IT, EV, AW

5. Student Expulsions – MB, KD, DG, AJ, NV, AS

6. Student Reinstatement - TH

7. Investment Report

8. Property Item Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

A. Real Estate Purchase in Highland

REPORTS

1. School Improvement Report for the Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent
High Schools

2. Membership Report

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S
INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Your Voice Counted: Vineyard URA May Be Revisited

2011-02-04T22:36:00.001-07:00

Today, the Utah State School Board instructed their URA representative, Larry Newton, to readdress the Vineyard URA. The concern from the board was the process for the URA. The board members did state they did not necessarily disagree with Mr. Newton's approval of the URA. However, most of the board were unaware of the URA. They felt with a URA of this magnitude, there should have been some oversight from the board. I, so appreciate, the State Board for recognizing this situation and wanting to mitigate it. Please let them know of your appreciation.

Also, there was discussion as to when Mr. Newton was appointed, originally in 1993 and most recently, perhaps in 2001 or 2002. The state board would like to set some standards as to length of time and dollar amounts for board involvement in these issues, instead of just allowing their representative to act in their behalf. Then, Mr. Newton's appointment to the URA was reaffirmed. Some board members mentioned all the emails they had received. So, thanks to all of you who contacted the state school board.

Our state school board member, Carol Murphy, was especially helpful in turning this into a discussion of Vineyard specifically, and not just a general discussion of their policy on URA's going forward. Also, fellow board member, Paula Hill, and citizen Jared Carmen, addressed the board on this issue during public comments. It appears those comments helped sway the board to discuss the specifics on Vineyard later in the day.

Next step: In order for the URA to actually be brought back to the table for discussion, there must be a 2/3 majority of the Taxing Entity Committee (TEC). This means the County Commissioners, and the Misc. Taxing Entity representative will need to be willing to bring this back to the table (as well as ASD). Please contact the County Commissioners and request they support bringing the URA back for negotiation. It is important to note Alpine's School Board is not opposed to the URA in principle, but is concerned with the terms right now. Two independent financial consultants and the Utah Taxpayers Association do not recommend the current scenario. So please contact all three commissioners, but especially Commissioner Ellertson (801-851-8133 larrye@utah.gov ) and Commissioner Anderson (801-851-8135 garya@utah.gov )--the County's 2 representatives on the TEC. Commissioner Whitney may be reached at 801-851-8136 or dwhitney@utah.gov .

Special thanks to my husband, Scott (who has to spend a lot of time making up work since he was babysitting), Paula's husband (who has accompanied her everywhere), and Joel Wright (for reading legislation and minutes, and writing the first letters).

But, most especially, thanks to all of you for contacting your representatives and asking to be heard!

Letter to State School Board from ASD parent: Why did you raise taxes $300 million in Alpine School District? (without one cent going to public ed)

2011-02-01T23:29:00.000-07:00

It may be possible to readdress the Vineyard URA if one of the parties who voted in favor of the URA is willing to go back to the table within 30 days. I would ask you to contact the Utah State School Board and Utah County Commissioner, Larry Ellertson and request they take another look at this project from the perspective of the ASD taxpayer.

In light of that information, and because I agree with the content, I have reprinted this letter (with permission) from a parent in our district to the Utah State School Board about the Vineyard URA. I have included everything as sent with the exception of an image file I am unable to upload to this blog. I have also deleted email addresses, phone etc. Thanks to Joel Wright for this letter and his information.

***************************************************

Dear Utah State School Board,

Did you know that on January 18, 2011 you raised taxes by $300 million

in Alpine School District?

Did you know that not one cent of that $300 million will go towards

public education?

Most likely you've never heard of this tax increase, and also believe

you never voted for it, but your attorney, Carol Lear, is claiming you

did properly approve and authorize this tax increase because of an

approval Larry Newton received 18 years ago in 1993. (See her email

below as EXHIBIT ONE to this email.)

I will explain the details below. But what I'm really writing to

request is that you reserve 20 minutes at your meeting on February 4,

2011 to get a 10 minute explanation from Larry Shumway and Larry

Newton as to why Larry Newton voted to approve this $300 million tax

increase on January 18, 2011, and also get a 10 minute explanation

from Alpine School District as to why they are absolutely dumbfounded

and horrified by Larry Newton's vote in favor of this tax increase.

In short, here are the undisputed facts:

Anderson Geneva purchased most of the land formerly used by Geneva

Steel in the city of Vineyard on the east coast of Utah Lake in Alpine

School District several years ago.

This land is inarguably "blighted" - meaning the land has extensive

environmental damage that requires remediation before it can be

developed.

According to independent evaluations, the cost of cleaning up this

environmental damage is $150 million. No one has produced any

document indicating it will cost more than this amount.

In early 2010, the "Vineyard Urban Redevelopment Agency" (or "Vineyard

URA") was created. The membership of the Vineyard URA consists of the

following members:

1. Two members from Alpine School District (Rob Smith and Guy Fugal)

2. Two members from Utah County (Larry Ellertson and Gary Anderson)

3. Two members from Vineyard City (Nathan Riley and Jim Carter)

4. One member appointed by the Utah State Board of Education (Larry Newton)

5. One member appointed by smaller taxing entities (Dave Pitcher from

Central Utah Water)

(You can see the limited minutes and meetings of this body here:

http://www.vineyard.utah.gov/interior.asp?pageid=3749&offset=0 )

This group met on January 18, 2011, and approved a $300 million

property tax break for the old Geneva site by a vote of 5 to 2 (only

Gary Anderson from Utah County was not present.) Alpine School

District voted against it, and everyone else who was present,

including Larry Newton, voted in favor of it. Because a 2/3 vote was

required to approve the property tax break, any one of the 5 votes

would have stopped it. In other words, Larry Newton's single vote was

enough for it to pass.

Alpine School District was led to believe that Larry Newton would NOT

vote in favor of the property tax break unless Alpine School District

was also willing to vote in favor of it, and was completely shocked by

his vote in favor of it.

I emailed Superintendent Larry Shumway on Monday, January 24, 2011

asking him the following questions, and still have not received a

response:

1. Why did Larry Newton vote in favor of this $300 million property tax break?

2. Why didn't Larry Newton inform Alpine School District that he was

going to vote in favor of the tax break? Why did he have to surprise

them?

3. Did an outside authority (like the Governor) encourage Larry

Shumway or Larry Newton in any way to vote for this tax break? If so,

what were their arguments in favor of it?

(PLEASE SEE THIS EMAIL BELOW AS EXHIBIT TWO.)

At any rate, we are simply mortified by this series of events down

here in Alpine School District, and believe we are at least entitled

to an explanation before we pay an additional $300 million in taxes.

Note also that outside parties like the Utah Taxpayers Association

have reviewed this $300 million tax break, and are completely opposed

to it. To date, everyone opposed to this tax break is willing to talk

at length about why they oppose, but no one who voted in favor of it

is willing to provide any explanation. Furthermore, everyone on both

the right and the left are united in their opposition to this $300

million tax break. This is not a partisan issue.

Please review the materials below, and feel free to call or email me,

or also to call or email anyone at Alpine School District on this very

important matter.

Finally, the most important thing you can do at this point is bring

sunlight to this matter, and schedule twenty minutes to hear from both

sides at your February 4, 2011 meeting. Note that Larry Newton is

already required under Utah Code 17C-1-402(11) to provide a written

explanation as to why he voted in favor of this $300 million tax

break, so it shouldn't require any additional time for him him to

prepare that write up now, and read it to you at your February 4, 2011

meeting.

I believe the students, teachers and taxpayers of Alpine School

District deserve nothing less.

Sincerely,

Joel Wright

Parent of children in Alpine School District

Taxpayer in Alpine School District

LIST OF EXHIBITS:

1. Exhibit One: Email from Carol Lear dated January 26, 2011,

stating Larry Newton was appointed to the Vineyard URA due to what

appear to be minutes from a 1993 State Board of Education meeting.

Copies of those minutes, as well as a 2001 and 2003 letter, are

attached in PDF.

2. Exhibit Two: Email from Joel Wright to Larry Shumway dated

January 24, 2011, asking Superintendent Shumway to explain Larry

Newton's vote in favor of the Vineyard URA. (No response received as

of January 28, 2011)

3. Exhibit Three: Statement from Alpine School District explaining

their opposition to the $300 million tax break.

4. Exhibit Four: Blog Post from Alpine School District Board Member

Wendy Hart explaining her opposition to the $300 million tax break.

5. Exhibit Five: Blog Post from Alpine School District Board Member

Paula Hill explaining her opposition to the $300 million tax break.

6. Exhibit Six: Editorial by Joel Wright (me) that appeared in the

Daily Herald in July 2010 expressing opposition to the $300 million

tax break.

7. Exhibit Seven: Blog Post from Community Activist Oak Norton

applauding Alpine School District's opposition to the $300 million tax

break.

EXHIBITS (below):

EXHIBIT ONE: EMAIL FROM CAROL LEAR DATED JANUARY 26, 2011 (relevant

materials attached in PDF):

---------- Forwarded message ----------

From: Lear, Carol

Date: Wed, Jan 26, 2011 at 5:35 PM

Subject: FW: Scan from a Xerox WorkCentre

To: Joel Wright
Cc: "Hauber, Todd"

Joel--I have two statements, signed by the former State Board Chair,

appointing Larry Newton (Taxing Committee Member) and Cathy Dudley

(alternate Taxing Committee Member). I also have two pages which look

like they are from minutes of a State Board agenda, dated July 14,

1993. I would like clarification that these 2 pages are, indeed,

Board minutes before I say that they are! The Board Secretary is gone

for the day. Even so, given the urgency of your request, I will scan

and email the pages. We haven't yet found a copy of an Agenda

identifying the specific "appointment." But those appointments or

assignments were more informal then; I will follow up tomorrow with an

agenda item (if there was one) during which the assignment took place.

Carol Lear, Records Officer

Utah State Office of Education

EXHIBIT TWO: EMAIL FROM JOEL WRIGHT TO LARRY SHUMWAY DATED JANUARY

24, 2011 (still no response received)

On Mon, Jan 24, 2011 at 10:37 AM, Joel Wright wrote:

> Superintendent Shumway,

> As I believe you are aware, on January 18, 2011 the USOE's representative on

> the Vineyard RDA voted to approve a $300 million tax break for the next 35

> years. This is the largest such tax break in the history of Utah, and has a

> number of long term consequences for Alpine School District, where I live

> and have children attending school.

> As I believe you are also aware, the USOE's single vote determined the

> outcome. A two-thirds majority was required for approval, and it passed by

> a vote of 5-2. Had the USOE voted against, it would have failed.

> Because of that, I would be grateful if you could provide me with the

> following information:

> 1. Written explanation of why the USOE voted in favor of the Vineyard RDA.

> When doing so, we would be grateful if you could specifically respond to

> the reasons why the Alpine School District is opposed to the current form of

> the Vineyard RDA here:

> http://www.heraldextra.com/article_7e8bbe7e-25a7-11e0-9839-001cc4c002e0.html In

> addition, further reasons why one individual board member of the Alpine

> School Board is opposed to the current form of the Vineyard RDA can be found

> here:

> http://wendy4asd.blogspot.com/2011/01/why-your-property-taxes-are-going-up.html

> 2. Why did you "surprise" Alpine School District with your vote?

> Historically, the State Office of Education has always voted with the

> School District on an RDA. Everything Alpine School District had heard from

> you until the vote on January 18, 2011 led them to believe that you would

> still vote against the RDA. Had you informed Alpine School District you

> were going to vote in favor of it, they could have used their vast network

> to contact the Utah County Commissioners and encouraged them to vote

> against. Maybe they should have been doing that anyway, but they are

> currently feeling like they were very much "surprised" by your sudden vote

> in favor of the RDA without any prior warning.

> 3. Did Governor Herbert, or anyone representing the Governor, or anyone

> from one of the Governor's offices, contact you or anyone at USOE before the

> vote on January 18, 2011 and encourage you to vote in favor of the Vineyard

> RDA? If so, can you please share with us who it was, and a summary of the

> reasons they gave to you to vote for the Vineyard RDA?

> Many Thanks,

> Joel Wright

> Taxpayer and Parent in Alpine School District

>
>

EXHIBIT THREE: STATEMENT EXPLAINING ALPINE SCHOOL DISTRICT'S

OPPOSITION TO THE $300 MILLION TAX BREAK:

http://www.heraldextra.com/article_7e8bbe7e-25a7-11e0-9839-001cc4c002e0.html

Alpine School District releases statement on Vineyard tax breaks

Posted: Friday, January 21, 2011 2:40 pm

Alpine School District officials on Friday released the following

statement about the recent approval of $300 million in tax breaks for

Vineyard development:

"Alpine School District did not vote in favor of the Vineyard URA.

District officials are members of the Taxing Entity Committee (TEC)

that voted in a meeting on January 18, 2011, where Alpine School

District voted no to approving the Vineyard URA. The voting members of

the committee were: Vineyard City (2 votes), Utah County (2 votes),

Alpine School District (2 votes), the State School Board (1 vote), and

one representing all other taxing entities (1 vote). There were seven

of the eight members present for the vote. Five voted in favor of

passing the URA, 2 votes - both from Alpine School District - voted

against the URA.

Alpine School District officials had three major concerns with the

original URA proposal:

The length of time - 40 years.

The 400 + acres of residential included in the plan. The taxes on the

homes do not pay for the full cost of the educational services.

The base year used for tax increment calculation was 2006. This was

based on Legislation originally proposed and passed by Senator Curt

Bramble in 2008. The concern that ASD has is that this will negatively

impact all tax payers in Alpine School District.

Members of the URA Proposal Committee met with the ASD Board of

Education in a study session on January 11. The length of time for the

URA had been decreased from 40 years to 35 years. Additionally, there

was discussion about mitigation payment, however, an updated proposal

that included the details about the mitigation was not presented.

A vote was taken one week later. ASD officials continued to vote

against the proposal. With a five out of seven vote in favor of the

proposal, it did pass. Despite the opposition of Alpine School

District officials, we will continue to move forward in working with

our community."

EXHIBIT FOUR: FROM WENDY HART, MEMBER OF THE ALPINE SCHOOL BOARD:

http://wendy4asd.blogspot.com/2011/01/why-your-property-taxes-are-going-up.html

SUNDAY, JANUARY 23, 2011

Why Your Property Taxes are Going Up: Vineyard URA

If you live in the Alpine School District, your property taxes are

going to go up. Due to the recent passage of the Vineyard Urban

Redevelopment Agency (URA) project, the county will automatically

adjust the tax rates and increase your property taxes and mine. The

question was whether a commercial entity should receive tax breaks for

the next 35 years in exchange for developing a blighted property.

This may be a good idea for the people of Vineyard, the developer and,

possibly, the state of Utah, but it is a bad idea for the taxpayers of

ASD.

First, let me give you some background. There are two types of

development projects CDA's (Community Development Agencies, like Adobe

or Micron) and URA's (like Geneva). The main difference is a URA must

develop a blighted area; whereas, a CDA does not. A URA allows a

development group to not pay their normal tax rate (above a certain

threshhold, for a specific time period) and instead use that money to

develop their property. A committee (TEC) of all the taxing entities

(City, County, School District, State Office of Education, etc.) is

formed, and must agree to the proposal by a 2/3 majority. In theory,

we give tax breaks to a development group to improve an area in the

short term, with an increase in taxable value and community and

economic improvement as the long-term gain.

The Vineyard URA comprises the former Geneva Steel property. It

includes areas that are contaminated and structures that would be

costly to remove. The developer has said without the URA monies, they

would simply have to fence about 700 contaminated acres and leave it

alone. Some local legislators feel that without this money, we would

have a big eyesore for decades. The developers and city of Vineyard

agree. But it is a gamble as to whether or not, in 35 years, that

property would be developed. In short, is this a necessary process to

clean-up the former Geneva property, and allow everyone to eventually

benefit?

Whenever I am faced with a decision, I try to decide which principles

apply. For me, government has no place picking winners and losers in

commercial activities. Some people's politics may allow for government

to be involved in commercial development. Mine, do not. If we give

tax breaks to one group of taxpayers, why not to all the taxpayers?

Having said that, we are forced, by law, to be involved. So, from a

pragmatic point of view, I need to find the best benefit I can to both

the schools of the district and to you, the taxpayers.

Here's how it works. Let's assume the property is worth $1 million

and ASD gets 1% in property taxes, or $10,000/year. With the URA, ASD

will still get their 1% every year of the URA from the developer. But

if in 2 years, the property value increases to $10 million, ASD gets

$10,000 but the developer retains $90,000 to reinvest in development

of the property, and so on. At the end of the URA period, say the

property is worth $1 Billion, then ASD would get their 1% or $10

Million. Every year after that, the property is treated the same as

any other property for tax purposes.

The school board felt this URA was a bad idea for the following

reasons. (Read the official response here.)

First, the state legislature mandated that instead of using current

property value, the URA had to use the property value from 2006. Why

is that important? Because the Geneva property value has gone up. By

using the 2006 value, the legislature gave this developer a greater

tax break. The consequence is that everybody else in the Alpine

School District must now pay higher taxes to make up the difference.

We were told that part of the reason for the 2006 base year was to

allow the developer to have 'seed money' for the development. If the

base year were not set by law to 2006, there would be no additional

burden on the taxpayers. It would just be additional revenues that

would be forfeited.

Second, 35 years is a long time. No one can predict what will occur

over the next 35 years. ASD is growing and has needs right now. Do

we honestly think the greatest demand for that property's revenue

won't be for 35 years in the future? Children who are being born now,

will have graduated from ASD schools, and be sending their kids to

those same schools before the benefit of this project will appear. It

is projected that ASD will lose a total of $200M in revenue over the

35 years. A Daily Herald article says ASD will receive $16

million/year from the Geneva site after the 35 years. $200 M lost /

$16 M year = 12 years to make up the lost revenue after year 35.

Third, the URA includes residential areas. These residences will have

children who will attend school in ASD. Even though ASD will not

receive any funds for those children, ASD will need to accommodate

them in district schools.

Finally, ASD had two independent financial consultants and the Utah

Taxpayers Association run the numbers. All three said the total

amount, length of time and rollback of the base year prevented them

from recommending that ASD sign on to this project. A representative

from the Taxpayers Association said it would cost $150 million to

remove the blight. This would allow the developer to correct the

problem areas, leaving them with usable property. Remember, the URA

was for $300 million. The tax payers are financing $150 million of the

actual development instead of simply making the property usable.

(For a good article on reclaiming the blight, but not subsidizing the

development, go here.)

ASD's two members on the TEC voted against the URA. The two reps from

Vineyard City, one of two from Utah County (one didn't show), one from

the Utah State Board of Education, and the member representing all the

other misc taxing agencies voted in favor of the proposal. As such,

ASD's taxpayers are obligated to go along. (Incidentally, an article

in the Daily Herald incorrectly implied ASD was in favor of the

proposal.)

If you agree this is a good proposal, then you need to do nothing. If

you disagree, you need to contact your legislators and share this

information with your neighbors.

From the legislation, it appears that a resident of Vineyard City can

appeal this URA decision. Do you know anyone who lives in Vineyard

City? I think this decision should be appealed.

Also, there is proposed legislation this session rolling back the

URA/CDA approval process from 2/3 majority to a simple majority. This

bill would result in even more unfair situations similar to the Geneva

property. ASD would be forced to participate in more URAs at the

additional cost burden to the average resident. I would recommend you

contact your legislators to oppose this legislation. They need to

understand the current situation in which you can be taxed without

your consent and without an appeals process.

To me this is a case of government redistributing your tax dollars.

ASD, or rather you and I and our schools, will be on the hook for many

of the 'tax breaks' over this period of time. My question to you is

"Will it be worth it?"

*Sen. Curt Bramble, a proponent of this project, authored legislation

that changed how CDA's and URA's operated. For the most part, I agree

with the legislation. It changed the approval process from a simple

majority to a 2/3 majority and gave the school districts more autonomy

and say. It also greatly limited the definition of a blighted area.

In the past, a broken fence or a dead tree limb could be construed as

blight. For a URA, all taxing entities must participate. For a CDA,

taxing entities must opt in to participate (Rep. John Dougall's

legislation); they are excluded by default from CDA projects. What I

disagree with is additional legislation (Bramble) setting the base tax

year for this particular project to 2006 (one year after the site was

acquired).

EXHIBIT FIVE: FROM ALPINE SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER PAULA HILL:

http://paulahill4u.wordpress.com/2011/01/23/geneva-ura-lehi-high-committees-agenda/

GENEVA DEVELOPMENT

About the Vineyard URA, or tax benefit to develop the old Geneva

property, the short answer to your questions is that we got skunked.

The Board and the District agreed that the demands were too stiff, and

both sides were maneuvering for the best terms. We worked with a

committee from Utah County, the town of Geneva, Alpine School

District, the Utah State Office of Education, a representative of all

other taxing entities such as the water district, and an at-large

member. Three votes would stop it, and we felt confident that ASD and

the USOE member held a strong hand.

Oops. They called a vote, the USOE voted in favor, and it was suddenly

all over.

The longer answer, although not very technical, is that the developer

needed tax breaks to be able to accomplish the massive clean-up and

build the ambitious commercial/residential design sitting on the

drawing board. The proposal was exciting and attractive, but the

concessions asked were pretty generous. In particular Alpine School

District was resisting the unheard of length of time, 40 years, and

the residential component, where property taxes from the 2300 housing

units projected would be reinvested with the development while the

district would still be required to educate the children from those

homes.

The third problem was the roll-back, or using the tax base from 2006,

before the power plant was built, when the property was worth

considerably less. Representative Curt Bramble, Provo, passed a bill

rolling back the tax rate for the property, which had the effect of

raising the tax rate on the entire district. Now that the

redevelopment is moving forward, watch for your next tax bill to

reflect a $15-17 increase for the average household for a private

developer to make big money improving the town of Geneva with your tax

dollars.

Anderson Development had scaled back to 35 years (that’s still two

generations of school children) and was preparing other mitigations

when the bargaining was suddenly all over. While this is certainly

political, it seems that each party was doing his job in representing

the interests of those they worked with. We will all enjoy driving

along I-15 and seeing a charming little development in place of

blight. But I do not understand the roll-back, nor the USOE abandoning

us.

I wrote earlier about seeing two columns, one for what we get and one

for what we give. The money guys have done this, and the conservative

estimate is that this deal will immediately cost ASD $30 million. Boo,

hiss.

EXHIBIT SIX: EDITORIAL WRITTEN BY ME (JOEL WRIGHT) IN JULY 2010 ON THIS TOPIC:

http://www.heraldextra.com/news/opinion/utah-valley/article_4ff275c7-cc36-5187-a8ae-8e00befea572.html

Developers frequently ask school districts to assist in the

redevelopment of land. The developer typically asks the school

district to provide property tax rebates to the developer's project,

which decreases the costs of the project, making it more economically

feasible (or profitable). The justification given for the tax rebate

is that the project will generate more tax revenue in the future for

the school district, so the school district should "invest" in the

project by giving the developer a tax rebate.

Possibly the largest such tax rebate in the history of Utah ($300

million) has recently been requested from Alpine School District by

Anderson Development through the town of Vineyard for the proposed

redevelopment of the old Geneva Steel site. Based on my read of the

Utah Taxpayers Association's review of the request, I believe the

Alpine School Board should support approximately half of the proposed

$300 million rebate through a redevelopment agency (or "RDA"), but the

second half is not justified and should be rejected by the Alpine

School Board.

When evaluating a proposed redevelopment project, school boards should

ask two questions. First, does the land have negative value? That is,

would a developer have to pay someone to transfer ownership in the

property? If the answer to that question is, "Yes," then an RDA may be

appropriate.

The second question is this: if the RDA is not approved, will the

transactions on the redeveloped site take place in the greater

community? If the answer to this question is, "No," an RDA can also be

appropriate. Unlike most RDAs, the Geneva RDA has elements relating to

both questions.

The former Geneva site is riddled with useless infrastructure, from

deep concrete bunkers to tainted dirt. These relics of the steel plant

have imposed negative value on the property. Based on Anderson

Development's projections, about $150 million worth of the

improvements contemplated in this RDA are necessary to bring the site

to a condition comparable to other greenfield sites. That much of the

proposed RDA is appropriate, and should be approved. Without such

approval, the land could remain any eyesore for generations to come,

and harm the economic development of Utah County.

But Anderson Development is apparently not content with that level of

taxpayer investment. They want the Alpine School Board and other

taxing entities to grant another $150 million in taxpayer subsidies

for their project. This additional investment by the taxpayer is not

justified because the transactions contemplated by that investment

will occur in the greater community, whether or not this Geneva RDA is

approved.

Over the 40-year term of this RDA, Anderson Development hopes to build

office parks, retail space and housing. Whether labeled as

residential, office space or storefront, all the development

contemplated in this portion of the Geneva RDA is retail. Tax

subsidies do not stimulate retail economic activity; rather, they

rearrange which city reaps the sales taxes associated with the retail

activity.

If the Alpine School Board participates in the second $150 million of

the Geneva RDA, the district will get nothing in return. Consumers

won't increase their spending because of the new retail location.

Every transaction in the proposed Geneva RDA will occur somewhere in

the greater community without that subsidy. The transactions may be in

Lehi or Orem, but they will occur. In other words, if the Alpine

School Board approves the second $150 million request, they will

essentially be shifting millions of dollars from existing cities and

businesses in the Alpine School District to the city of Vineyard and

Anderson Development. So, while this request clearly makes sense for

both Vineyard and Anderson Development, it does not make sense for all

the other cities and businesses in the district.

The plight of the Cottonwood Mall illustrates the folly of retail RDAs

like the second half of the Geneva RDA. Almost two years ago, the

Granite School Board approved an RDA to subsidize the redevelopment of

the Cottonwood Mall. The Cottonwood Mall proposal would have used

nearly $100 million over 20 years to facilitate retail, office space

and residential units.

Although the subsidies were approved, no redevelopment of the

Cottonwood Mall has taken place. The reason for the failure is simple:

tax subsidies do not change the amount of consumer spending. They

merely move an economic transaction from one place to another. They

spur no new economic activity.

In summary, the Alpine School Board should separate the proposed

Geneva RDA into two $150 million pieces. The piece that eliminates the

site's negative value is appropriate, and the Alpine School Board

should participate. The second piece, which subsidizes economic

activity that would happen without the subsidy, is inappropriate, and

the School Board should reject it.

• Joel Wright, of Cedar Hills, is an attorney.

EXHIBIT SEVEN - blog post from Oak Norton:

http://www.utahsrepublic.org/civics/kudos-to-asds-board/

KUDOS to ASD’s Board

January 26th, 2011

To the Alpine School District Board,

I know we periodically find ourselves at odds but I am very pleased to

find us on the same side in the issue of the Vineyard Urban

Redevelopment Agency. I understand that in the recent vote, your

position was outvoted by others who would financially benefit by the

arrangement. I also understand that taxpayers within the school

district will be on the hook for a couple hundred million dollars over

the next 35 years. This is the classic case of democratic majority

rule where 2 wolves and a sheep vote on what to have for dinner. The

rest of the committee appears to benefit by saddling the rest of the

district taxpayers with their development. I was quite surprised to

hear that the representative from the state office of education didn’t

vote with the school district. That seems quite odd and opens up

questions into how they arrived at their position.

Short of a successful legal challenge, there may not be a lot that can

be done to prevent this injustice. However, I would like to suggest

something for your consideration.

Vineyard voted to pass their hundreds of millions of dollars of

development costs and developer tax breaks on to the school district

taxpayers’ while we continue to pay for their children to be educated.

It seems appropriate to return the favor and publicly announce that at

your next board meeting you will be discussing the possibility of

splitting Vineyard off as a separate school district. This doesn’t

have to be a serious consideration, just a warning shot across the bow

that help Vineyard realize they’re affecting the lives of many

citizens outside their town. Taxation without proportional

representation has a downside when others choose to dissociate

themselves from them.

The County may have *some* limited responsibility to clean up the site

but giving massive tax breaks to the developer after that is entirely

inappropriate.

Taxpayers aren’t going to be excited about cleaning up Vineyard,

giving massive tax breaks to a developer, and paying for a brand new

bond in ASD. Thank you for standing for fiscal responsibility and not

taking important future revenue from the ASD.

Sincerely,

Oak Norton, Utah’s Republic

END OF ALL EXHIBITS AND THIS EMAIL

Jan. 25, 2011: Orem City Council Meeting and Jan. 27, 2011: Investment Committee Meeting

2011-01-27T16:10:00.000-07:00

Orem City Council

Tuesday, Jan. 25, most of the board, the superintendent, and business office, met with the mayor, some staff, and members of the Orem City Council. I was told the reason for the meeting was to develop relationships and to address common issues. The Vineyard URA was discussed. We presented our side of it. Some members of the Orem side were supportive but felt they couldn't say much. One member is the listing agent for the property and felt ASD should have communicated with Vineyard more about this issue. Some board members mentioned that they had brought this to Orem's attention more than a year ago, and ASD was in discussions with Vineyard all the while.

My Take:

The ASD Board meets with Orem City every other month for lunch. It has been suggested meeting with Lehi City on a regular basis, as well. I think it is good to get know people with whom you will have dealings, but I will be asking about getting to know those in the rest of the cities we represent. I understand the district hosts an annual luncheon with all the city -related staff/elected officers from all the cities in its boundaries. ASD also schedules additional meetings with individual cities when major issues (e.g. construction projects) take place. It was suggested to me (by one of you) that multiple, smaller annual luncheons take place with two or three cities involved in each one. I am going to propose this.

Investment Committee:

Today, I was able to phone in on the Investment Committee meeting. (I've been ill, so I didn't want to share.) Most of the committee meetings are district staff meetings with the superintendent and/or other staff. Some of the Board are assigned/invited to attend to keep up with the doings of the district. I am unsure how much of this is public (I assume all of it, since it's money), but until I find out, I will refrain from commenting further. Suffice it to say that the board has approved an investment policy, and the current actions of the investment committee are following that policy. There was a suggestion to adjust the investment policy. That will be prepared by the district staff, and submitted to the Board for approval. I agree with this suggestion, and since it will be approved in an open Board Meeting, you'll get more information on it later.

Jan. 25, 2011 Work Session and Board Meeting

2011-01-27T15:48:00.000-07:00

Work Session: Bond Survey

The district is going to survey about 600 residents on the bond. Some of the questions are to inform the residents and some are to inform the district. The survey will:

Test the pulse of the district
Be a report card for the district
Test the dollar amount for the bond
Test the reasons for and against the bond

Included in the survey are options to deal with the growth (about 12,000 more students) if we do not bond. Two of those present had been involved in double-sessions at a Junior High in 1962 in the district and found it a less than pleasant experience. Some board members were concerned that double-sessions would lead to kids going to school in the dark and others coming home in the dark. There are also concerns about with so many kids in limited spaces, there will be a reduction in what programs each student may be able to take.

I asked about building smaller facilities. The concern is schools are required, by law, to be community centers. So, there are equity issues involved in building less in one area of the district than in other areas of the district. When Lehi JH was planned, it came without an auditorium. Evidently, there were complaints, and the auditorium was added.

The survey company has counseled us to do property owners, not just registered voters. The board can decide to do whatever it likes. The cost is roughly $8K.

The current bond numbers are a total of $210M to build 4 elementary schools, and 1 junior high. It will also allow for major improvements/renovations in some older schools (e.g. AF, PG, etc.), and additional work on seismic and other maintenance issues on other schools in the district. It is assumed the property taxes on the average home (230K) will increase $12-$15/year.

A seismic survey was professionally done a few years back. There is a list of specific schools and specific improvements that need to be done. We can do it all, but not as fast as we would like. The bond should assist with completing this work faster.

The state used to provide about $8M/year in capital funds. Four years ago, ASD received $16M in capital funds. Last year, it was less than $1M. We do not budget any state monies for capital improvements anymore.

We could use existing capital reserves to build the junior high, but there would be no money left in the reserve account for any of the other schools to have capital expenditures (e.g. buses, computers)

The average costs to build are as follows.

Elementary: $10M
Junior High: $30M (180K sq ft)
High School: $55M (349K sq ft)

The Board will have Board Training on Monday, Jan. 31. We will review the Code of Conduct. This is our opportunity to determine how board members will do business with each other. We will also establish goals and a direction, both by reviewing previous goals, and then setting our own.

My Take: Bond Survey

I think it is fine to survey people on the bond. It is preferable to find out now if there's any support for it before time and money are spent on promoting it, if the people are not in favor of it. I am still on the fence about the bond. The reduction in capital monies from the state was interesting. I would appreciate any suggestions and comments on how to accommodate additional students in the next 5 years. I think any and all ideas should be considered.

Board Meeting at Oak Canyon JH

Six people were given awards by the Alpine Foundation, and the Student Council and their teacher were recognized as well.

The PTSA has 600 members (parents and students) and have enjoyed many activities including 22 of 31 Reflections entries being selected to go on to higher levels. They also sponsored Freedom Week to help students appreciate the freedoms they have and the price that was paid to maintain them. It culminated in a Veteran's Day Assembly with Veteran speakers and a very powerful slide show.

The SCC is responsible for allocating Trust Lands' money to different programs. They struggle over how to spread the money over the entire school. They spent money on
1) Read 180 for struggling kids
2) Providing AP Course that go beyond Honors Courses
3) MyAccess program for online writing. This used to be funded by the district, but is not any longer.

The principal spoke of their theme: Together We Learn for Life. He is proud to be part of a district with a collaborative process that focuses on student learning. They went through an accreditation process that was good for finding out where they were strong and where they were weak. Their mission is to ensure student success through 1) collaboration, 2) data analysis, and 3) collective inquiry.

Community Comments:

One parent spoke about the lack of busing for one development by the new elementary in Saratoga Springs. Their children will need to cross Redwood Road to get to school. She appreciates the funding concerns, but wants to make sure the kids are safe. The superintendent and the 2 assistant superintendents have been discussing this. They assured her, they are looking at options and will get back to her on the issue. The legislature reimburses busing costs where communities are 1.5 miles or more away from the school. Otherwise, the school or district must come up with this cost on their own.

Another parent was concerned with the lack of communication to the parents after the gun incident at Westlake High. The Superintendent indicated that they did not handle the communication well. (Everyone agreed that the actual incident was handled superbly.) As a district, we are revising our procedures to communicate with parents in a more timely fashion on issues such as these.

Action Item:

Boundaries for the two new elementary schools in Saratoga Springs were approved.

Board Committee Reports

Friday, Jan. 28, the board is invited to the USBA (Utah School Boards Association) Day on the Hill at the Capitol Building. There will be USBA meetings and a chance to meet with the legislators. I will be going.

A closed session was held to discuss personnel and property issues.

Why Your Property Taxes are Going Up: Vineyard URA

2011-01-23T23:23:00.000-07:00

If you live in the Alpine School District, your property taxes are going to go up. Due to the recent passage of the Vineyard Urban Redevelopment Agency (URA) project, the county will automatically adjust the tax rates and increase your property taxes and mine. The question was whether a commercial entity should receive tax breaks for the next 35 years in exchange for developing a blighted property.  This may be a good idea for the people of Vineyard, the developer and, possibly, the state of Utah, but it is a bad idea for the taxpayers of ASD.

First, let me give you some background. There are two types of development projects CDA's (Community Development Agencies, like Adobe or Micron) and URA's (like Geneva). The main difference is a URA must develop a blighted area; whereas, a CDA does not.  A URA allows a development group to not pay their normal tax rate (above a certain threshhold, for a specific time period) and instead use that money to develop their property. A committee (TEC) of all the taxing entities (City, County, School District, State Office of Education, etc.) is formed, and must agree to the proposal by a 2/3 majority. In theory, we give tax breaks to a development group to improve an area in the short term, with an increase in taxable value and community and economic improvement as the long-term gain.

The Vineyard URA comprises the former Geneva Steel property. It includes areas that are contaminated and structures that would be costly to remove. The developer has said without the URA monies, they would simply have to fence about 700 contaminated acres and leave it alone. Some local legislators feel that without this money, we would have a big eyesore for decades. The developers and city of Vineyard agree. But it is a gamble as to whether or not, in 35 years, that property would be developed.  In short, is this a necessary process to clean-up the former Geneva property, and allow everyone to eventually benefit?

Whenever I am faced with a decision, I try to decide which principles apply. For me, government has no place picking winners and losers in commercial activities. Some people's politics may allow for government to be involved in commercial development. Mine, do not.  If we give tax breaks to one group of taxpayers, why not to all the taxpayers? Having said that, we are forced, by law, to be involved. So, from a pragmatic point of view, I need to find the best benefit I can to both the schools of the district and to you, the taxpayers.

Here's how it works. Let's assume the property is worth $1 million and ASD gets 1% in property taxes, or $10,000/year. With the URA, ASD will still get their 1% every year of the URA from the developer. But if in 2 years, the property value increases to $10 million, ASD gets $10,000 but the developer retains $90,000 to reinvest in development of the property, and so on.  At the end of the URA period, say the property is worth $1 Billion, then ASD would get their 1% or $10 Million. Every year after that, the property is treated the same as any other property for tax purposes.

The school board felt this URA was a bad idea for the following reasons. (Read the official response here.)

First, the state legislature mandated that instead of using current property value, the URA had to use the property value from 2006. Why is that important? Because the Geneva property value has gone up. By using the 2006 value, the legislature gave this developer a greater tax break. The consequence is that everybody else in the Alpine School District must now pay higher taxes to make up the difference. We were told that part of the reason for the 2006 base year was to allow the developer to have 'seed money' for the development. If the base year were not set by law to 2006, there would be no additional burden on the taxpayers. It would just be additional revenues that would be forfeited.

Second, 35 years is a long time. No one can predict what will occur over the next 35 years. ASD is growing and has needs right now. Do we honestly think the greatest demand for that property's revenue won't be for 35 years in the future? Children who are being born now, will have graduated from ASD schools, and be sending their kids to those same schools before the benefit of this project will appear. It is projected that ASD will lose a total of $200M in revenue over the 35 years. A Daily Herald article says ASD will receive $16 million/year from the Geneva site after the 35 years. $200 M lost / $16 M year = 12 years to make up the lost revenue after year 35.

Third, the URA includes residential areas. These residences will have children who will attend school in ASD. Even though ASD will not receive any funds for those children, ASD will need to accommodate them in district schools.

Finally, ASD had two independent financial consultants and the Utah Taxpayers Association run the numbers. All three said the total amount, length of time and rollback of the base year prevented them from recommending that ASD sign on to this project. A representative from the Taxpayers Association said it would cost $150 million to remove the blight. This would allow the developer to correct the problem areas, leaving them with usable property. Remember, the URA was for $300 million. The tax payers are financing $150 million of the actual development instead of simply making the property usable.   (For a good article on reclaiming the blight, but not subsidizing the development, go here.)

ASD's two members on the TEC voted against the URA. The two reps from Vineyard City, one of two from Utah County (one didn't show), one from the Utah State Board of Education, and the member representing all the other misc taxing agencies voted in favor of the proposal. As such, ASD's taxpayers are obligated to go along. (Incidentally, an article in the Daily Herald incorrectly implied ASD was in favor of the proposal.)

If you agree this is a good proposal, then you need to do nothing. If you disagree, you need to contact your legislators and share this information with your neighbors.

From the legislation, it appears that a resident of Vineyard City can appeal this URA decision. Do you know anyone who lives in Vineyard City? I think this decision should be appealed.

Also, there is proposed legislation this session rolling back the URA/CDA approval process from 2/3 majority to a simple majority. This bill would result in even more unfair situations similar to the Geneva property. ASD would be forced to participate in more URAs at the additional cost burden to the average resident. I would recommend you contact your legislators to oppose this legislation. They need to understand the current situation in which you can be taxed without your consent and without an appeals process.

To me this is a case of government redistributing your tax dollars. ASD, or rather you and I and our schools, will be on the hook for many of the 'tax breaks' over this period of time. My question to you is "Will it be worth it?"

*Sen. Curt Bramble, a proponent of this project, authored legislation that changed how CDA's and URA's operated. For the most part, I agree with the legislation. It changed the approval process from a simple majority to a 2/3 majority and gave the school districts more autonomy and say.  It also greatly limited the definition of a blighted area. In the past, a broken fence or a dead tree limb could be construed as blight. For a URA, all taxing entities must participate. For a CDA, taxing entities must opt in to participate (Rep. John Dougall's legislation); they are excluded by default from CDA projects. What I disagree with is additional legislation (Bramble) setting the base tax year for this particular project to 2006 (one year after the site was acquired).

Jan. 25, 2011 Board Meeting Agenda: Oak Canyon Jr High

2011-01-22T14:46:00.000-07:00

OAK CANYON JUNIOR HIGH

111 SOUTH 725 EAST

LINDON

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

A study session will be held prior to the regular board meting. The purpose of the study session

will be to receive a report from the Bond Committee, particularly in regards to a proposed survey

to patrons, and to discuss other current issues.

BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

AGENDA ITEMS

PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Debbie Taylor, Board President

REVERENCE “

STUDENT RECOGNITIONS “

ALPINE FOUNDATION RECOGNITIONS “

PRINCIPAL, PTA AND SCHOOL “

COMMUNITY COUNCIL REPORTS

COMMUNITY COMMENTS* “

ACTION ITEM

1. Approval of the Boundaries for the Two Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

New Elementary Schools in Saratoga Springs

BOARD MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS Debbie Taylor, Board President

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Jan. 11, 2011 Board Meeting

2011-01-22T14:44:00.000-07:00

Work Session:

The Vineyard URA was discussed. The board was opposed to the proposal, and instructed its representatives, Guy Fugal and Rob Smith, to vote against the URA at the Taxing Entity Committee meeting on 1/18/2011. They did as instructed, but the URA passed anyway. More on this in an upcoming post.

Board Meeting:

Community Comments:

Kids’ Cause, a non-profit, charitable organization, presented awards. Kids’ Cause receives voluntary payroll deductions from school employees and donations from private and corporate individuals to provide clothing and other items for needy school kids.

4 representatives from Cascade Elementary came to discuss the needs of the school. They realize there is a process for determining which schools and which needs will be addressed by the proposed bond, but they wanted to take the time and present the information in person.

2 additional patrons commented on the great work and atmosphere of the district. One, in particular, wanted to make sure that, even though we should hear the voices of those who think there are problems in the district, there are many who are pleased and happy and won’t be contacting us to say they are pleased and happy. She wanted to make sure that we listened to all the voices, but then stepped out in a united front to support our schools.

Claims: The claims are the expenditures for the past month that are approved by the board. The report was 373 pages, and I reviewed as much as I was able. The superintendent was willing to spend time going over and investigating some of the expenses for me. However, due to a lack of good understanding, both myself and fellow board member, Paula Hill, abstained from voting to approve the claims. I will be working to get a better understanding of how to manage these expenditures and would welcome your efforts, as they are posted on the district website several days prior to the board meeting. All expenses require approval of supervisors, and anything above $5000 requires cabinet (high-level district administration) approval. Anything above $10,000 requires board action to approve.

Routine Business was approved.

Discussion Items:

School Boundaries: There are 2 new elementary schools going in near Harvest and Saratoga Shores. The boundaries were displayed, and will be voted on by the board on Jan. 25, 2011. Please contact me with your feedback.

Membership Report: This report compares the Oct. 1 enrollment with Dec. 31 enrollment. ‘Membership’ is a term to describe kids who are enrolled. If you are only enrolled ½ time, then you count as ½ a person in terms of membership. If you move out of the area after ¾ year, then you are ¾ of a person for the yearly membership totals. Membership is used to determine funding from the state and project student population growth. There was a net increase of 81 students from Oct to Dec. There were 22 at Deerfield, which is out of the ordinary.

Board Member Reports: The board attended the Utah School Board Association (USBA) Convention (more on that in a subsequent blog post) Jan. 6 -8, 2011 in Salt Lake. This convention had a 98% attendance rate in Utah, which is unheard of nationally. Most board members attended the Open Meeting Law presentation as required by state law. Board President, Debbie Taylor, noted who had attended and who still needed to attend. She is responsible for declaring to the state that all board members have been properly trained on this topic every year. The meetings with legislators were very informative. Many attended the classes on Professional Learning Communities.

Adjourned for Closed Session

Jan. 11, 2011 Board Meeting Agenda

2011-01-10T23:02:00.000-07:00

STUDY SESSION

4:00 P.M.

The purpose of the study session will be to review the Vineyard URA and share information

from the Utah School Boards Association Convention.

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

6:00 P.M.

AGENDA ITEMS
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Debbie Taylor, Board President

REVERENCE “

RECOGNITIONS “

COMMUNITY COMMENTS* “

MINUTES “

CLAIMS DECEMBER Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

ROUTINE BUSINESS

1. Budget Report Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

2. Personnel Reports “

3. Alpine Foundation Report “

4. Student Releases - JA, LB, HD, DE, JG “

AJ, CM, JR, JR, JR, DS, NT, SW “

5. Student Expulsions - QN, BW, BW “

6. Property Items “

A. Easement in Vineyard

B. Easement in Saratoga Springs

C. Property Transfer of Old Cedar Fort School

DISCUSSION ITEMS

1. Boundary Proposals for Two New Elementary Schools

REPORTS

1. Membership Report Vernon Henshaw, Superintendent

BOARD MEMBERS’ AND SUPERINTENDENT’S INFORMATION ITEMS

CLOSED SESSION

ADJOURNMENT

Dec. 14, 2010 Board Meeting and Jan. 4, 2011 Superintendent's Meeting

2011-01-04T15:35:00.000-07:00

Board Meeting: 12/14/2010

For information on the Work Session that occurred prior to the Board Meeting, please read part1 and part2.

Public Comments:
One woman came to comment on the $2M bonus given to all district employees. She wanted to make sure that everyone knew that she has been pleased and supportive of the schools and the school district, but she felt she needed to make a comment ever since she found out about the bonus. Her concerns were:

If there was money left over (1.5%) at the end of the fiscal year, why wasn't it saved for a rainy day fund? It bothers her that everyone else is cutting back and this money was spent in difficult times.
Basics need to be taught. How many teachers or aids could have been hired?
She sees some extravagant spending. She likes extra-curricular activities, but, for example, drama productions--which she very much enjoys--have elaborate costumes and back drops. They do an excellent job, but she would like more focus on the basics.
The basics must come first. Taxpayers are happy to pay for basics but not for "extras".
Overall, why was $2M used in these tough times?

A group from Greenwood Elementary appeared to thank Board Member, Tim Osborn for his service and his work with them.

Recognition of Out-going Board Members:
Each out-going board member and their families were recognized and given a small gift. They got time to share their thoughts. I especially appreciated the comments of my predecessor, Chrissy Hanneman. She said that a mayor in Hawaii used to say that a prophet said, "When you are serving your fellow man, you are serving God." She said she really felt that was what serving on the board was about...serving others. She felt her family was benefitted in many intangible ways, despite the time required from her. She said this, specifically, to me, and I really appreciated it.

Personally, I would like to thank Chrissy, Donna, and Tim for their years of service--the time, the energy, and the personal sacrifice. I have big shoes to fill.

Education Jobs Program:
This is the money that the Feds gave to the state and the school districts. There needs to be specific approval of the use of the money by Board Action.

ACT Pilot Program:
The State is going to cover the cost of the ACT test for all students (juniors) this year ($33/student). They will also pay $8 or $10 fee for the PLAN test (10th grade) and the Explore test (9th grade). The goal is that by encouraging more students to take the ACT, we hope to increase the number of students who pursue a post-secondary education and vocational training. ACT Prep classes are offered at all High Schools (during the day and after shool options). It is hoped that the state will continue to implement this program in subsequent years as well.

Claims and Routine Business Items:
The Claims were approved by the Board, as were the routine business items. These items are available on the ASD Board Website several days prior to a board meeting. They can be downloaded and reviewed by the public. The most difficult thing for me is the claims report. The one from December is over 300 pages long. There is a set of summary pages, and then all of the detail. I would certainly appreciate any help in reviewing this information. The Routine Business Items have been discussed in prior Work Sessions and Board Meetings (in the Discussion Items part of the Board Meeting).

Closed Session:
We then held a closed session. I found it interesting that the closed session beginning and ending times were noted, and an audio recording of all but the personnel/student issues was kept. I assume this is due to state statute.

Committee Discussion:
After the closed session, we discussed the proposed committee assignments. These assignments will be voted on at the Jan. 11, 2010 Board Meeting.

End of Board Meeting for 12/14/2010

This Week:

1/4/2011: Superintendent's Meeting
Today, I attended my first Superintendent's Meeting at Suncrest Elementary in Orem. Three Board Members meet once a week (on a rotating basis) with the Superintendent at one of the district schools. We get information about the current goings-on of the district and items of interest. Then we recognize an outstanding team from the school, as recommended by the principal, and take a tour of the school. I think it is good for getting to know the principals, some of the staff, and the individual schools.

In discussing the Bond, I would like to outline the procedure for what items will be included in the bond.
1. Principals and maintenance staff determine what items they are recommending for inclusion in the bond.
2. The principals also meet with the PTA's and SCC's to get information from them on school needs.
3. The principals then meet with the district staff members about these items.
4. The staff, including the Bond Committee, put together a proposal.
5. This proposal is then sent back to the PTA's and SCC's for more feedback.

Oath of Office: 1/4/2011
Tonight, I will be taking the Oath of Office, along with my fellow, newly-elected board members.

Orem City Council Meeting: 1/5/2011
The Board meets with the Orem City Council about once every other month. This is scheduled for tomorrow. I will write up what I can in a future blog post.

USBA State Convention: 1/6-8/2011
This convention takes place at the Little America Hotel, in Salt Lake City. It is starts Thursday evening, and goes through Saturday, afternoon. I will write up my experiences in an upcoming post.

Dec. 14, 2010 Work Session, Part II: School Grades, SCC Mission Statement, Bond

2011-01-03T23:05:00.000-07:00

Work Session, Continued

In this post, I will discuss the remaining items from the work session on Dec. 14, 2010:

Proposed Idea of Grading Schools
School Community Council (SCC) discussion on the Mission, Vision, Values, and Goals and Bond
More information on the proposed bond

Grading Schools

The legislature is considering a proposal to give public schools a grade, e.g. A-F. In light of that information, the Utah State Office of Education (USOE) is proposing their own grading system. Some of the items they would like to include for grading would be attendance, graduation rates, ACT participation/performance rates, students reading on grade level, # of credits that a student is prepared for in Jr. High to High School, safe school data, course taking information, enrollment demographics, subgroup performances. (I assume by subgroup, it is demographics, advanced placement, etc. but I will get clarification on this.) The USOE’s proposal contains a broad spectrum of criteria for grading (and it may be that each school will be given multiple grades, one for each area, instead of just a single, overall grade. The superintendent would prefer the broader, more comprehensive grading system.

My Take: Grading Schools
I think this is a popular idea. Parents want to know how their kids’ schools compare, where they are strong and where they are weak. However, like all things, the devil is in the details. The difficulty in all of this is assigning a grading system based on reliable criteria. In our lives, we grade our vendors every day, by patronizing their establishments. If the plumber does a good job for me, I call him back again, I pay him a tip, and I recommend him to my neighbors. If he doesn’t, I don’t call him again, and he may go out of business. With a government entity, like schools, we haven’t found a way to determine the best way of rating schools. They get the same number of dollars whether we approve or disapprove. While it is difficult to do, I think it still has merit. I would welcome everyone’s comments on how best to do this. Along those lines, I have heard (not during this work session), that ASD is looking at doing some sort of merit pay for teachers as well. Again, please let me know how you would go about determining teacher performance as well as school performance.

SCC Meetings on MVVG (Mission, Vision, Values, and Goals)

In order to consolidate all the data collected from the meetings throughout the district, the PR Committee instructed the staff to summarize the notes from each meeting. In doing so, the result was a chart of those who supported the mission statement, those who would like to see it “tweaked” or changed, and those who would like to drop it entirely and start all over. There were a few comments listed to the side in the summary. It was stated that there were 614 participants across the district, 30 who wanted to change the mission statement in some way, and only 9 who wanted it completely dropped. 8 of the 9 were at one meeting (Mountain View). The documentation was emailed to me the day after the work session.

My Take: SCC Meetings on MVVG and Bond

While I find it commendable to get community feedback, especially on an issue generating quite a bit of discussion, I am concerned with the way this was done. In the interest of full disclosure, I am opposed to the mission statement: “Educating all children to ensure the future of our democracy”. See my comments here and here. Let me share my concerns with this process, and make a few recommendations.

First, the School Community Council meetings seem to make sense for a local, community-input, kind of meeting. However, most people in the community are not aware of the SCC’s or of their role in ASD of being a ‘sounding board’ for district issues. Until I started running for school board, I had a vague notion of the SCC’s, and did attend one (and tried to attend another but was turned away) when we were discussing the math program (to replace Investigations). I was not aware of their use on a district level for feedback and input. In addition, SCC elections are not well publicized. The candidates are listed with only their name (no platform, no website, no information), and many people I spoke with during the campaign had never heard of them. So, while the SCC is valuable in getting feedback from those on the council, it is not representative of the parents at the school, and certainly not of the community at large.

Second, these particular SCC meetings, at least at my school, were held outside the normally scheduled time. I received a note from one of my consituents letting me know that he attends all the SCC meetings for our school, and the MVVG was never discussed. Well, anyone who regularly attended the SCC meetings could have easily missed this meeting. The district scheduled these meetings, and, it's quite possible, the SCC was given this information after their previous meeting. It was also held, at least in my case, at 10am, which doesn't bode well for attendance--especially from working parents. To my school's credit, I received an email about it perhaps 4 or 5 days in advance. Because of these things, I would have to say that the deck was stacked against the average parent attending those meetings. Further, how would someone without kids at the school find out about the meeting?

Third, it is common knowledge that how you ask a question, oftentimes, dictates the response. To correctly interpret polls, one must know both the statistical results and how the questions where asked (the methodology). From my SCC experience, we were told that the meeting was there for the district representatives to be able to explain their position on the mission statement. We were told that it was not a forum for debate. Given this, there aren't many people who are going to see this as a real opportunity for input. You are there to respectfully listen.

Fourth, how does one determine how many people wanted to change or drop the mission statement without explicitly asking? Most people, if their concerns are appropriately expressed, will not reiterate them. So, if one person stated concerns that were shared by those in the audience, how do we know which audience members also agreed, since they didn't speak up? Also, because of my candidacy, my husband and I felt it wouldn't be appropriate for us to comment. As such, our silence was counted as support. The summary sheet, in addition to the school name, shows three tally columns and a comments field. The columns are: # attending, change mission statement, and drop mission statement. In seeing this, I had a hard time understanding the distinction between changing and dropping the mission statement. However, the numbers in those columns were subjectively derived from the comments noted by the administrators at those meetings. Here is a sample comment: "I want our children to learn reading, writing, arithmetic and history. No vision of our society..." Is this a change (tweak) comment or a drop comment? What are the criteria? The only accurate way to tally this information would be to take a vote at some point in the meeting, clearly defining what is meant by change or drop. To imply otherwise is completely inaccurate and not the least bit factual.

In short, this issue needs to be laid to rest, not by force of will, but by having an open debate. As we were told, the SCC meetings were not a forum for a debate. But why shouldn't there be one? Additionally, we need to find a good method of communicating to everyone in the community about public meetings, and inviting all comers, not just those who have kids at the district schools, to comment on broad, directional things, like the district's mission statement. For all the talk about democracy, this report shows that the district does not want to hear the voice of all the people on this issue. If they do, they need to find a more effective way.

I was told the new board will be addressing the mission statement. I am unsure as to when. If we can't agree on a mission statement that will be acceptable to all, then we need to have a well-publicized, open hearing to actually have the debate on this issue. If we want to go so far as to have a vote, then so be it. But, I feel we are getting caught up in this issue, and it is distracting us from our main goal of educating our children for whatever purpose they (and their families), not the district, choose.

Bond

There are 3 corners of the triangle that are used in determining whether to bond and the amount. They are Growth (# of students to be served), Capital (amount of capital expenditures required), Tax Rates (how the bond will affect you and me). The bond committee will reconvene in January to make recommendations. The work session was to look at alternatives to bonding. Obviously, if there is no debt, the tax rate goes down. If the bond is for $150 million, the tax rate should stay flat. (The reason for this is that a previous bond is expiring, so this bond would just take its place.) If the bond is for $240 million, there would be a significant impact to the taxpayers. The district is proposing around $200 million, which would be a slight increase. In January (this month), the principals and maintenance people will meet to determine a list of capital projects (major projects where the 'useful life' is greater than one year) that are needed.

Here are some proposed options.

1.) Don't bond now, but delay a year. This is possible. It would require buying more portables and satellites with restrooms for the additional student populations. The challenge would be the junior high. We could delay the bond a year, and build the junior high with current reserve funds.

Here's what that would look like.

There is currently $18 Million in the Capital Fund. We usually get $10 - 11 Million in Capital funds each year. So, if a junior high costs roughly $53 Million, we could take $7 Million from the Capital fund every year for the next 5 years ($35M + $18M reserves). We would start with $25M ($18M in reserves plus $7M of the $10 or 11 we will receive the first year), and build over 2 years. However, in the last 2 years, we have only received $4M/year, and it takes $3M/year for our technology and transporation costs. So, depending on the capital budget we receive from the state, may not be an option. Also, we would then have no reserve funds.

2.) Wait more than a year for the bond. The concern is the central facilities (gyms, hallways, cafeterias, science, business, and CTE labs) at Vista Heights, Hidden Hollow and Westlake may not be able to accommodate the growth. With 1400-1500 kids at Hidden Hollow and 2300-2500 at Vista Heights, it's do-able for a year or so, but you do need a plan to divide that many.

At the conclusion of this presentation, each current and prospective board member was asked to comment. Here are some of the comments that I noted.

Concern for where a satellite could be located at Hidden Hollow. It was stated that the citizens of Eagle Mountain and Saratoga Springs are very supportive of the bond.

With the concern over the central facilities and over-crowding, it may require doing a double-session. (I understood this to mean, 2 sessions of students, one morning and one afternoon.) A couple of board members said that a double-session isn't in the best interest of kids--one from personal experience growing up.

In the A2 area (Alpine, Highland, Cedar Hills, and parts of Lehi), there is not a lot of call for capital expenditures. The only capital concerns were the seismic ones at Alpine Elementary.

My comment was that I didn't have enough information to make a statement on the bond. Everyone else, seemed to indicate support for the bond.

My Take: Bond

Based on the numbers given to me, the bond seems like a no-brainer. The projected student population is expected to be in the neighborhood of 78,000 in the next 5 years. (Currently, we have 66,000.) There are 4 schools that are 50 years old and require capital improvements (suggested repair amount $100M). Also, according to the last work session, the bond should increase property taxes on the average home ($230,000) $15/year. One bond is being retired at the same time this new bond would be "coming online". Taking on new debt (200 million) as we retire old debt adds a total of 50 million to the overall number. I don't like new debt. But the numbers, as presented, indicate a need for the investment.

However, where it is the district's role to suggest to the board what they would recommend, it is the board's job to get all the information from multiple sources, filter through it, and give the direction to the district. At this point, I have not done any independent research or analysis, and I am still learning about the way our property tax system works in Utah. I have received a few comments from you, the taxpayers, but would like to receive more. Most especially, how would you propose to handle roughly 10,000 additional students in the next 5 years and the costs associated with maintaining 50-year-old buildings?

Up Next (only 1 more post to get through Dec. 14, 2010):
The actual Board Meeting

Dec. 14, 2010 Work Session, Part I: Common Core, Gov. Education Committee

2010-12-30T17:35:00.001-07:00

There was so much information presented at this Work Session, that I will be breaking the blog entry up into pieces. I want to give you the information on what occurred, but also give you my perspective on these important items.

In this blog, I will address the first two items of the work session: Common Core standards and the Governor's Education Committee.

Work Session, 4pm

Common Core

The Utah State Office of Education has opted, along with many other states, to adopt the Common Core Standards. The Common Core standards were initiated by the National Governors' Association and their Chief State Education Officers. In Utah, this was Gov. Huntsman and Patti Harrington. The Common Core only addresses Language Arts and Math. Barry Graff presented this information. Here are my notes on the Common Core.

What is the difference between our current core and the common core?

Lang. Arts: The reading difficulty level will increase. There is also a higher expectation of writing and the use of analysis, including a set of standards relating to informational texts. (Informational texts according to one article "is a type of nonfiction that conveys information about the natural or social world.") This common core has much, much, much more emphasis on writing, especially reading and writing informational texts. I think I heard that the Common Core would encourage Kindergarten students to do research work. Published writings will include digital formats. There will not be as much emphasis on literature; although there will still be some.

Math: There are two big differences. 1) Common Core will do away with the concept of spiraling. (Spiraling is defined as teaching a particular concept at multiple grade levels.) With Common Core, we have a given concept taught at a particular grade level and that's it. 2) Common Core will cut back on the number of concepts taught. It is the idea of more depth instead of breadth. At the Secondary level, instead of having pre-algebra, algebra, geometry, algerbra 2, etc., the international model is being used that integrates algebra, geometry, etc. into each course. There will also be an Honors' track that will put additional preparation in for an AP Calculus course. Also, ASD is looking at creating a 3rd 'Accelerated' track. Honors would be deeper information and Accelerated would be a faster track. The hope is that this integrated approach will solve the 'algebra 2 wall' that kids hit after taking a year off of algebra to tackle geometry. There will have to be in-the-year remediation as there is no 'slow' track.

Mr. Graff said that it is a good core, and that they don't have any concerns with it. ASD is going to take a slightly slower time frame for implementation. The State was hoping to get districts to implement the Common Core this coming year, and ASD will implement in some instances in the 2012-13 school year. Depending on where students are in their studies, they may or may not be included in Common Core. For example, a current 7th grade student taking Algebra will continue with the current system through their high school career. However, a current 7th grade student taking pre-Algebra will switch to Common Core when it is implemented.

Superintendent Henshaw said that change is good as long as it makes us better. We will be taking the 2011-12 school year to train our teachers in Common Core. The Superintendent said that we can't hold teachers accountable if they are not sufficiently trained.

Some concerns raised by the board members were that we currently are more lenient on High School students with partial grading and making things up than are colleges. It was stated that this is an individual teacher thing, and not a district-wide situation. It wouldn't apply one way or the other to Common Core. Another concern was that we would be adopting a European model where kids are tested at a certain point, placed on a track, and that's the end of it. It is a concern that in a given track, kids may be pushed too fast and end up failing, giving them short shrift.

Common Core is just being developed and hasn't been tested in its entirety in any area of the US yet. The question was asked about who would be developing the tests, and the assumption is that the testing will be outsourced to some 'testing' company. Adopting Common Core and the tests that will become associated with it will probably take the place of current testing standards to accommodate Federal Education mandates.

My Take on Common Core
Common Core, Math:
First, I agree with the idea of greater depth instead of breadth with math. One of the reasons I support using Singapore Math is due to their in depth treatment of each basic concept. For example, my son, when in 5th grade, spent about 5 lessons on decimals and place value (unrelated to fractions). During the summer, we had spent time doing Singapore, and he had a very good foundation in fractions. It was then transitioned through 15 lessons to teach decimals. The 15 lessons were not just boring repetition either. They were just good, in depth, exercises and discussions so that at the end of 15 lessons, he had a solid foundation in decimals and how they related to fractions. My experience is that we tend to push kids into greater mathematical concepts before they have mastered the basics. So, I am definitely in favor of this idea.

However, I am concerned with the lack of 'spiraling'. As I mentioned above, pushing kids to greater math concepts without basic mastery is dooming them to failure. Math is very much a subject that requires a "line upon line" concept. If you can't add, you can't learn to subtract, and you can't do algebra. Repetition and review is very important in math as you continue through the process. Not having a remedial track or allowing kids to retake things like algebra, is a very big concern for me. If someone is struggling with algebra, I would certainly like to see them spend whatever time is necessary to master basic, algebraic concepts before moving on. My personal experience and my assumption is that 'the algebra 2 wall' is not so much that kids aren't using algebra but that they can comprehend geometry without algebra. They didn't properly master algebra 1, so algebra 2 doesn't make any sense either. The fact that they've taken a year off of 'algebra' just exacerbates the situation.

Common Core, Language Arts:
While I think informational texts are important, my kids don't sit around reading a lot of informational texts. They enjoy fiction, literature, and classics. Reading Narnia or A Christmas Carol is often more fun than reading about volcanoes, especially if you aren't very interested in volcanoes. Informational texts are very helpful for kids who have an interest in the subject discussed. Without that interest, I'm afraid we are going to turn kids off to reading. I applaud the idea of greater writing skills. However, doing research work, while important, shouldn't be given greater importance than creative writing. Writing skills can be applied from one to the other. Like math, good writing requires good understanding of grammar and spelling. As long as we are developing the ability to write, I don't want to limit the experience to mostly informational texts.

Common Core, In General:
While I need to get more specific information on Common Core, I have a few additional concerns.

First, where this core is untried and untested, we are turning our children into guinea pigs for the State Office of Education (and the textbook publishers who stand to benefit). I would prefer to see the results before jumping on the bandwagon.

Second, the idea of national testing and national comparisions will, inevitably, yield national standards. From national standards, it is very easy, using testing and teaching to the test, to implement a national curriculum, leaving local control of curriculum out in the cold. If Utah adopts Common Core, and Common Core, at some point, starts to teach things that Utah doesn't want to include, what are the "opt out" procedures? How fast will we be able to switch to something we want to teach, once Common Core and the major textbook publishers have incorporated those changes we think unimportant, or, maybe, incorrect.

Governor's Education Committee

Board Member, JoDee Sundburg, has been a member of the Governor's Education Committee. The main goal from this committee is: by 2020, 66% of Utahns ages 20 - 64 will have a post-secondary degree or certificate. The reason for this figure is that it is assumed that by 2020, businesses will need that level of expertise to compete. So, this is what Utah feels it needs to be economically strong at that point in the future.

There are 5 main items:

Bolster Early Childhood Education
Improve instructional Quality and Curricular Alighments
Strengthen Postsecondary Education
Aligh Educational Attainment and vocational Training with Economic Development
Utilize Technology to Effectively and Efficiently Accomplish Strategic Imperatives

The steps to pursue in 2011, based on cost effectiveness and value that do not impact current per-pupil funding are listed here, near the end of the article.

My Take on Gov. Education Committee:
I would like to know what percentage of Utahns have a post-secondary degree or certificate currently. What is the change that needs to take place? Also, when we have so many people taking college courses, etc., the law of supply and demand will indicate that the value of those degrees will probably decrease.

While I think it is fine that the Committee has made its recommendations, I do have a concern that the state should be involved at all in incentivizing personal behavior to this level. Often, on-the-job training is more beneficial than a degree or certificate. As someone who has hired people in the past, I see education as an indicator of someone's ability, but I would much prefer someone who either has the knowledge/experience already, or who has shown that they can be a self-starter and someone who learns on-the-job. These things are not always the result of a higher education degree or certificate.

Up Next:
A Proposal for Grading Schools
Report on the Mission Statement from the School Community Councils
Additional Information on the Proposed Bond

Oath of Office

2010-12-27T15:02:00.001-07:00

On Tuesday, Jan.4, 2011, I will be taking the oath of office. I invite everyone who is interested to come. It is at 6:00 pm at the District Office (575 N. 100 E.) in American Fork and shouldn't be very long.

The Oath is stipulated in the Utah State Constitution, Article IV, Section 10. It reads:

I do solomnly swear (or affirm) that I will support, obey and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this State, and that I will discharge the duties of my office with fidelity.

In preparation for this oath, I have re-read the US Constitution (including the amendements), and am in the process of reading, for the first time, the Utah State Constitution. The most interesting thing I have found, so far, is the repetition of the phrase no citizen shall be "deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law" (US Constitution: Amendments 5 and 14, Utah Constitution, Article 1, Section 7). Combined with the oath to "discharge the duties of my office with fidelity", I think that places a very large burden on myself and my fellow board members for the fiduciary oversight of the district. It then follows that without an elected board, our constituents would be taxed without representation, being deprived of "property without due process of law". Part of the reason for this blog is to give you insight into my thinking, but also to give you a forum for communicating with me. I am sworn to uphold both the US and the Utah Constitutions. I plan to consult them frequently in determining how to faithfully discharge my duties as a school board member, in your behalf. I hope that you, too, will take some time to read through these documents, and judge my performance based on this oath.

In addition to the oath of office on Jan. 4, we will be voting on the President and Vice-President of the Board. These officers have no more authority but more responsibility. The President attends more of the committee meetings, conducts board meetings, and gives the offcial direction from the Board to the Superintendent. The President is also the only one who is to communicate concerns from the district (i.e. the superintendent) to individual board members. It is inappropriate for district personnel, including the superintendent, to correct or otherwise instruct a board member. The Vice-President is there to take over when the president is absent. Under Utah Law, these elections for board officers must take place in an open meeting, and cannot be done by secret ballot.

Proposed Legislation: Superintendent Retention Election

2010-12-20T16:20:00.004-07:00

On Monday, Dec. 13, the Daily Herald reported that a Salt Lake legistlator is proposing to create retention elections for local school superintendents. At first, I thought it wasn't such a bad idea, since it would require people to be more involved. (I'm big on that parental involvement stuff). But then, I thought about our retention elections for judges, and started to dig a bit deeper into all the ramifications. I would like to give you my input on this, as a newly-elected school board member.

Currently, the locally-elected school board is responsible for interviewing, hiring, reviewing, disciplining and firing the district superintendent. The superintendent works directly for the school board, and takes his/her direction from them. The school board, being elected, are to take their marching orders from their constituents.  If you don't like the superintendent, you don't re-elect the board members who made the hire.

This is an important difference between a republic and a democracy.

In our republic, everyone does have a voice in choosing their representatives. This is an important part of the process. However, we delegate our power of decision-making, in specific areas, to those elected representatives. In a republic, these representatives become informed, study the issues, and make decisions in the way that best represents their constitutents (and their inalienable rights). If our representatives are not doing this, we do not need to appeal to higher government to make them do it. We the People have the power to remove them and replace them with someone who will. We delegate our power to our representatives because we want to have decisions made thoughtfully and with all the facts. We think it unreasonable to assume that most voters would want to spend time on the important minutia in order to make an informed decision.    And if the decision is uniformed, then it is unfair.

The voters, even in a group, have much less power to direct the superintendent once every six years, than 5 or 7 members of a school board that are observing, directing, and evaluating the superintendent on matters great and small nearly every week. Retention elections might get rid of an unpopular superintendent, but it does nothing for day-to-day management. The problem isn't the system of boards managing superintendents. The problem is boards not being accountable to the people who elected them.

In addition to the major structural change in our republican system of government, I offer a few items for your consideration should this proposed legislation become law.

First, the board would become irrelevent at certain times. Currently, the board is "the boss". However, in light of a retention election, once a board appointed a superintendent, the superintendent would need to balance the direction of the board against popular opinion. Every major decision would become a political one and might require a focus group. In essence, the superintendent would have two masters: the board and the public. Depending on how close it might be to the retention election, the board's direction would be superceded.

Additionally, if the superintendent took direction from the board, and the board was wrong, would it be fair to punish the superintendent? Would it not more properly be the board's responsibility? Should the board not face the people and be accountable to them?

What about confidential matters of personnel or litigation? Since these, by law, are closed to the public, would those records be opened in order to properly inform voters prior to an election? And if not, this is a huge area of responsibility for which the superintendent would not be held to account.

With all due respect, the problem with a superintendent is not the superintendent; it is the board. If you are not pleased with your superintendent, I would argue that you are more accurately not pleased with your board representation. How much have you been involved and been communicating with your board members? What input has the board received from you? What accountability do you have from your board member? Do they have a website or a blog where they can be held to account by their constitutents? How closely do your concerns and issues match with your board member? Do you think they will accurately represent you vis-a-vis the district and the superintendent?

By the same token, if you were asked to vote to retain your superintendent, have you attended board meetings? Have you reviewed the financials? (If so, I'd like to enlist your aid.) Does the superintendent accurately follow the board's direction? If the board has given the superintendent direction that you disagree with, will you vote against retention?

If it were your job on the line, would you rather be judged by someone who sees your work up close and personal, who sets your job description and evaluation points, or by the stockholders of your company, based on reputation alone?

In all fairness, I am just starting to understand the job of the superintendent. I would not yet find myself qualified to accurately determine the fitness of the superintendent.  In two years (when our superintendent's contract is up), I will have a much better understanding of the responsibilities and qualifications for the job. In two years, if you continue to read this blog, you, too, will understand the issues in the district, my perspective on them, and the roles the superintendent and the board play in those issues.

Also, in two years, another set of board members will be up for reelection. Times have changed. People are more involved in overseeing their representatives. I expect, in two years, you will see a lot more websites, cottage meetings, and YouTube videos from those wishing to represent you. Lawn signs and an endorsement from a friend of a friend of your neighbor's will no longer be enough to win an election.

But most importantly, I expect, in two years, you will find me accountable to you for the direction the superintendent has taken. You will then know where I stand, and can properly lay the responsibility on me and my fellow board members. You have delegated to us the responsibility of making those important decisions, with all the information available.

The system isn't broken, it just isn't being used properly. We are a constitutional republic. We elect representatives to buffer the sometimes-transient opinion of the majority. We are seeing changes at the local level to make board members more accountable. Hold our feet to the fire. Make us answer the difficult questions. And see the beneficial results of a constitutional republic over that of a democracy.