Wake County school board members might still sing Kumbaya after all during the two-day retreat today and Saturday with Superintendent Tony Tata.
As noted in today's article, Tata says a big chunk of the retreat will be focused on how to build consensus. He said the retreat will also provide an opportunity for board members to better get to know him and each other.
“I’m not saying that we’ll agree on everything,” Tata said. “My intention is to discuss with them the best practices for high-functioning boards.”
The retreat comes after school board member Kevin Hill's two consensus-building work sessions were cancelled this month because of scheduling conflicts.
Tata said the Broad Superintendents Academy is paying for Jim Huge to facilitate the event. Along with the audits and assistant it's providing, it's another example of how Broad is becoming more heavily involved in Wake.
One of the things Tata said will be discussed is communications protocol between him and the board. Tata said he wants to know when the board wants him to communicate with them on issues.
For instance, Tata said he's asked board members to let him know anytime that they contact staff. He said he's also asked staff to let him know anytime they contact board members. He said this allows him to learn about what's happening.
"What I want is a unified governance structure," Tata said.
In advance of the retreat, Tata gave school board members some advance reading. He gave them copies of the book "What Schools Boards Can Do: Reform Governance for Urban Schools."
Today's meeting runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the third-floor conference room at Apex Town Hall, 73 Hunter Street. Tomorrow's meeting runs from 9 a.m. to noon in the board conference room at 3600 Wake Forest Road in Raleigh.
School board chairman Ron Margiotta said he's hoping they'll be able to cancel Saturday's meeting. He said he's willing to stay later today. Whether other board members agree remains to be seen.
UPDATE
The Friday meeting has been moved to a third-floor conference room.
Comments
Board Communications, Governance, etc. Discussion in Retreat
Fri, 02/25/2011 - 16:06 — WakeCountyParentHow hard will it be for the "Disparate Nine" to conform to the "once the Board makes a decision, all Board members will support it publicly regardless of how you voted" challenge. Very interesting discussion...am loving this afternoon phase of the retreat.
Broad Foundation in Durham as well
Fri, 02/25/2011 - 13:56 — juliemaxwellFYI- our former DPS superintendent, Carl Harris, was also a Broad fellow having participated in the same program as Tony Tata. He now works for US Dept. of Ed but we have retained high level staff with Broad sponsored training. This press release below the line from 2007 touts a $400,000 "gift" from the Broad Foundation to pay for our entire school board to be trained.
Wake County- GET READY to TEACH TO THE TEST! and test and test again and again to better train the children to choose the correct bubble. Get ready to spend lots of $$$$ and many school days on practice tests, and new "data systems." Get ready for your teachers to be scripted to better guarantee test scores. Isn't this all that matters? If you believe that there is a difference between training and educating you may want to be careful when accepting "gifts" and "free consultations" from the Broad Foundation.
---------
May 2, 2007
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Michael Yarbrough, Communications Coordinator
Office of Public Affairs, 560-2602
DPS Board, Superintendent to participate in governance training
DURHAM—Durham Public Schools is one of six districts selected by the Center for Reform for School Systems (CRSS) to participate in Reform Governance in Action (RGA), a comprehensive two-year training program for school boards and superintendents.
The goal of the RGA program is to dramatically improve student achievement and eliminate the achievement gap in each participating district by cultivating effective reform leadership. Intensive training uses original case studies, review of best practices, and analytic tools. The $400,000 cost per district will be underwritten by TheBroad Foundation through a grant to CRSS
About Broad Foundation...
Fri, 02/25/2011 - 10:28 — bpuli9999What is so surprising that Broad is playing an increasing role in Wake County? It's philosophies match those of the current board (and of course, the current superintendent - it's certification is his only educational qualification). Running schools like private businesses, increasing the number of charter schools, etc. They also recommend basing teacher raises/bonuses on test score results. Let's see where that goes in Wake County.
Streaming on WRAL
Fri, 02/25/2011 - 10:13 — shank56Just looking online and I see the meeting is being streamed but hasn't started yet.