Jackson school district to form strategic plan

What began in July and picked up steam in January is expected to reach its first major milestone by June for the Jackson school district.

Superintendent John Link, who signed on as head of the district July 1, has been leading a new strategic plan.

“We started discussing it back during my interview for the position,” he said.

The five-year plan kicked into high gear in mid-January after the results of an 837-person survey became clearer.

The survey, which polled participants on things they would like to see in the district, has given rise to a Strategic Planning Committee of 27 parents, community members, teachers and students. It also has helped identify areas of particular interest to stakeholders.

The most important point so far is class sizes. Because of the district’s growth, student-teacher ratios have risen, often with 25 or more students per class.

“The biggest issue so far is, what do we feel is an effective class size, and how will we reach that?” Link said.

Along with the strategic plan, Link said a new facilities plan will attempt to project what buildings or learning spaces will be needed as the district expands.

Part of that is deciding whether classrooms with rows of desks are necessary, or whether open, technologically driven designs will be more appropriate in preparing students for the real world.

Such a space could include some kind of 1:1 computer initiative, but Link said it’s going to be more important to keep technology at the forefront of education. That goes beyond computers or other electronic devices to the ways in which work is accomplished in the digital age.

“If we have to build in the future, we want to get an idea of what that classroom will look like,” he said.

Another key point is finding more opportunities for students to perform community-service work.

“That’s one of those things that wasn’t on our radar, but that’s been talked about quite a bit,” Link said.

All these issues and more will be hammered out in the next few months by five action teams of 20 to 25 members each.

Now that the Strategic Planning Committee has drafted a mission statement and other formal parts of the plan, the action groups will meet about specific priorities and bring their goals and objectives back to the main group. Everything then will be presented to the school board in June, which is when the mission statement and other parts of the plan will become public.

“The mission statement tries to tell a little bit about who we are, what we believe going forward, and what we expect high-school students to achieve by their senior year,” Link said.

A consultant and former school superintendent from Virginia is helping facilitate the process. Link said the district tapped Kevin Castner of Cambridge Strategic Planning instead of going through the process alone because of his experience and to avoid serving any one agenda.

“He comes in and allows everyone to have a voice,” Link said, adding, “The end result will definitely be worth it when we see a plan.”

ljones@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3652