[ARPS Comm] Information flow from the bottom up

[mcgowan]

Rick thanks for starting and chairing the Communication Task Force.
It
certainly is needed and has quite a big charge -- and good group with
strong opinions. I know people want to start on an action list but I
think the problems in communiciation need to be understood before an
action or task list can be formed. Also, administrators and teachers
need to weigh in on what they see as problems and how different
solutions would actually work.

Also, let me say, rather cheerfully, that the points that I tried to
make at the meeting seem to have eluded your summary notes. I was
trying to say, however unclearly, was that the school system has no
effective way (and I think little desire) to collect information from
parents and students. When I gave my examples, I wasn't seeking help
or just to complain -- I was trying to illustrate these points. My
basic point is that the school system has no effective way to collect
the
large amounts of useful information parents and students have about
the schools --
or from its own staff to see how they are handling problems.

The opinions of parents and students are rarely consulted when
evaluating projects, programs, curriculum or teachers. Parents and
students have a tremendous amount of detailed information about the
schools.
This information is largely uncollected. Baer pointed out that the 4
surveys he has completed do not cover these issues and I totally agree
with him. The survey Mike Hayes showed us was much better but realize
this
is the first survey that I've seen that is so specific. It also
does not go out to all students thoughout the system. I have never
been
asked what I thought of an individual teacher (useful I would think
when evaluating a
teacher or deciding whether to give them tenure) or what I thought of
a specific program or curriculum. My kids haven't been asked either.
A lot of what I have to say is good. My kids have had excellent
teachers and really interesting projects in school.

The second problem is that administrators (i.e. principals, vice
principals, dept. heads or the superintendent) have little knowledge
of when parents contact teachers about problems -- what those
problems were -- or how they were resolved. Since there is no system
(that I know of) where teachers report contacts with parents and
problems raised,
administrators do not know what problems were raised, what the
response was, whether the response worked and if the parent felt the
issue was resolved. A teacher could have 10 parents contact him with
the same concern, fail to resolve the issue and the principal would
have no idea that any contact was made at all -- if no parent spoke to
the principal.
If one parent spoke to the principal, he could think that only one
parent
(or student) was having this concern. The school systems failure to
track problems or even parent contacts is a kind of voluntary
blindness. If company executives depended on the tenacity of
dissatisfied customers to climb the ladder to give them the bad news
of product defects or poor service, they would miss most problems.

A principal would never know if I contacted a teacher since I stopped
contacting the principal. This has never worked in my experience.
If the teacher, my child and I can't work a problem
out, I stop contacting the teacher and either wait for next year or
fix the problem myself by hiring a tutor, etc.. I am not alone in
this experience or in the sense that taking a problem upward does not
work.

It's one thing to have a process for getting help. It's
another thing to have an effective process. And it's third thing to
have administrators even to check what is going on in the process.
Another parent at the meeting spoke about her experience in raising a
problem up to the superintendent level and how nothing was done. I
know from talking to other parents that her experience was not unique.

The consequence is that parents stop complaining -- or start raising
issues and insights on blogs, at school committee meetings or directly
to school committee members. Or someone writes a letter that over 200
parents quickly sign. Then the response of adminstrators and teachers
becomes largely a defensive reaction. Parents also complain to each
other -- or they start a charter school -- or they go to charter
schools or private schools (which are usually extremely responsive to
parents). If there were systematic ways to collect information from
parents and students -- and ways to track and fix problems, parents
would not likely not go to other outlets. If the school system was
collecting information and actively tracking and resolving problems,
schools could build on their strengths and constantly improve.

My experience tells me that our school system (like most others) does
not really want to know what parents or students think. Only once has
the school system asked parents why they have taken their kids out of
Amherst schools. And this suggestion to do an exit survey was resisted
for years. I was encouraged by the teacher at the meeting who
surveyed her students about the class and found the answers very
useful. That makes sense to me. I talk to kids a lot; they have a lot
to say about their education and teachers. So do their parents. Some
opinions are whacky but most aren't. Are other Amherst teachers doing
these kind of questionairres with their students?

So my question for the Taskforce is how can our school system collect
and use the large amount of information that students and parents have
about the schools? I recommend that this be an agenda item for the
next
meeting.

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