The school board is meeting tomorrow, May 2, at 5:30 at the Miller Center on Gosse Court. This meeting's only focus is drafting a policy on district outcomes. We'll be discussing how to take existing documents (such as the district mission statement and the diversity and equity mission statement) and place those commitments in the board's new policy framework.

While the school year is winding down, for the school board, it feels like the start of a new year. In the past month, we've welcomed new commissioners Jeff Wick and Ryan McLaren. The Board re-elected Mark Porter and Stephanie Seguino as chair/vice chair, but the month of April still brought significant re-organization. The Board's committee structure has changed significantly because of our adoption of a new form of governance. Beginning in April, we have a new set of policies (save those required by state or federal law, which have not changed) and you will see some differences in how Board agendas are organized as the year goes on.

Our new form of governance is called policy governance. This system has been used quite successfully by the Onion River Coop. The board hopes that its new governance approach will bring benefits for the whole community, as well as streamline the board's own deep attention to its responsibilities. In policy governance, much of the board's work is done by monitoring how well the board itself, or the superintendent, carries out work toward the district's outcomes. At tomorrow night's meeting, we'll be working on drafting that statement of outcomes--what our new policy system calls the "ends policy." We will be working with a local consultant, starting by looking at how existing statements (such as the Mission/Vision/Values statement that evolved with extensive community input) can be expressed in our new framework. Tomorrow night's meeting would be of interest to anyone who wants to understand policy governance more deeply, as the consultant will be helping the board think through what the ends policy is and how it works. Once the policy is drafted, it will be read at multiple board meetings.

(A note on terminology: If you look at the district website, you'll see tomorrow's meeting listed as a "special meeting," which simply means it's a meeting held off the regular second-Tuesday-of-the-month spot. Special meetings can have very ordinary agendas; that it's called a special meeting doesn't signify anything in particular about the nature of the work for the evening.)

Susanmarie Harrington
sharrington@bsdvt.org

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