The WW-P School district has re-scheduled its community forum for two dates: Saturday, February 12, and Tuesday, February 15, as part of its ongoing effort to involve the community in the budgeting process.
Superintendent Victoria Kniewel made a presentation during the board’s January 25 meeting to describe the process by which the board was engaging the community and evaluating input.
“With challenges come opportunities,” Kniewel said. “Since the recession and the loss of state aid, we have been restructuring for more efficiencies.” And part of that process involves engaging stakeholders year round, she said.
School administrative officials have already been holding monthly meetings with principals and other stakeholders, including board members, central office staff, teachers, association leadership, PTA and PTSA officers, senior citizens, students, and the superintendent’s advisory council.
Officials also hope to gain more input from the community forum, which was originally scheduled for January 27, but was canceled because of inclement weather. The first forum on Saturday, February 12, will be held from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. On Tuesday, February 15, it will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. Both forums will take place in the High School South Commons.
“We need your help to answer the question, ‘What’s Important in WW-P,’” a press release about the forum stated. “The purpose of the first-ever community forum is for parents, students, staff, residents, and elected officials to come together and discuss priorities for the school district. This forum will provide opportunities for all attendees to be part of a larger discussion about the district’s vision and priorities.”
The district has solicited the help of a Princeton University graduate student, Dan Myers, who has been working with the superintendent on a process to engage stakeholders around the values that are brought to the table when discussing the district’s budget.
“It is our hope that this discussion will help everyone to appreciate what is important, to review what worked when the 2010-’11 budget was crafted, and to articulate what the group believes can be done to reduce expenses for future budgets,” said Kniewel.
During the community forum, the public will be invited to engage in small-group discussions about a list of suggestions that would affect the 2011-’12 budget. “The goal of these meetings is to gather information about how the public feels about specific changes and to build an understanding of how a budget is prepared,” Kniewel said.
At the January 25 meeting, Kniewel discussed the ways the public’s input will be analyzed.
The process, she said, entails taking ideas from stakeholder forums and providing feedback on their ideas, including reasons, decisions, time lines, and other factors to consider.
“The attention is on the process,” said Kniewel. “What we heard numerous times was, ‘I told you that idea; you should have used my idea.’” So officials created a system that would allow them to be transparent about which ideas can be implemented and which cannot, she said.
Ideas are evaluated based on the ease of implementation and the impact on the budget. The ideas are put into four categories: high ease/low impact; high ease/high impact; low ease/low impact; and low ease/high impact. Kniewel said the district would like to get as many ideas as possible that would fall into the high ease/high impact area, although not many fall there.
“We take revenue generating ideas and ideas to reduce spending and break them down into categories,” Kniewel explained.
Part of the criteria used to evaluate ideas includes the impact on students, alignment with core values; dollar impact and savings; time involvement and effort; legal concerns; the level of risk; impact on other processes; and the likelihood of success, Kniewel said.
“There are some ideas that come forward that aren’t always legal for a school district,” she said about some ideas presented.
Officials have also begun a shared training program with other districts, including Princeton, Montgomery, and Scotch Plains that will examine process and performance management strategies.
