A Proposed List of Tasks for a Strategic Plan for a Local School District
(Rochester Heights Schools)
The inability to develop and execute a good strategic plan can easily paralyze the running of a school district. This is because good educational planning helps to improve students outcomes, enhances the reputation of a given district leadership as well as keeping great tutors. Any failure in strategic planning can be highly detrimental. In strategic planning, there is goal setting and decisions on the course of actions integrated to achieve the goals as well as mobilizing the key resources needed to take those actions. In a broad sense, school districts of all sizes use strategic planning in order to achieve the broad goals of enhancing student outcomes as well as responding to changing demographics within the confines of the funding given. Strategic planning in education help educators to become early adopters of blending the strategic plan with community activities. In educational program planning, different professionals are brought on board in order to collect necessary information which is used to make critical decisions in regard to any anticipated future changes. This paper is, therefore, a development of the proposed list of tasks for a strategic plan for Rochester heights school district. The strategic plan proposed for Rochester will only give a completed mission statement with other proposed methods of completing other essential elements.
The strategic planning Committee
The strategic planning committee for the Rochester heights school district is the main body that is responsible for guiding all work in order to help achieve the mission and vision of the district. The committee is comprised of 36 representatives from different stakeholder groupings including community members, students, and parents, district administrators such as interim superintendent, staff members, faculty members, and educational board members. The involvement and community transparent are key priorities of the committee where all committee planning meetings shall be open to the public and thus the community members are encouraged to attend. The roles of this committee shall include the following:
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Developing a close work relationship with the superintendent through the provision of initial recommendations of the strategic directives and priorities as well as undertaking a forward-looking analysis in the long-term visioning.
The committee is responsible for the review of goals and objectives in order to quantify progress in performance monitoring.
The committee shall develop and recommend necessary legislative strategies to the board of educators.
Strategic communication and outreach.
The Mission statement
The mission statement of Rochester heights school district shall be “to nurture, educate and graduate civic-minded learners who are ethically equipped to make informed decisions; who are also competent communicators, confident, equipped with skill in problem diagnosis, creative thinkers with a positive career motivation and knowledge for a multi-cultural dynamic society”.
Strategic goals and objectives
The Goals and objectives are created by the committee in order to continually have working systems which meet the purpose (Establishing strategic goals, 2016). They include:
Improving student performance in order to prepare them for high school with an objective of enhancing the rigor of curriculum and expectations for student performance.
Developing and communicating the district identity and achievements with an objective of fostering student social-emotional skills.
Maintaining a stable financial position as well as safe productive facilities with an objective of retaining a long term financial stability while still improving and expanding quality programs.
Methods of examining current programs and developing new programs
In order to establish a good strategy, an examination criterion will involve answering different questions at specified points in order to develop new programs if the current one is not fit for progress. The criteria shall involve scrutinizing whether the strategy gives the general direction, is minimizing resistance and obstacles, is fitting the resources and opportunities, is advancing the district mission or whether it is reaching those affected.
Possible curriculum-planning initiatives
The committee shall set goals for the school district through the strategic planning process which will also encompass several major curriculum initiatives (Ford & Ihrke, 2019). Below is a list of the curriculum-planning initiatives;
Improvement of student learning
Encouraging innovation, creativity, and collaboration
Revision and review of the curriculum from time to time
Setting good career strategies
Tools for gathering input from all stakeholders
In Order to effectively engage all stakeholders, a basic process of five components is put in place and implemented rigorously (Jones & Jones, 2017). This process involves;
Identifying each stakeholder and how to influence them for optimum results
Analyzing and prioritizing interactions with each stakeholder to know which approaches they can table.
Planning on how to engage and communicate with each stakeholder while upholding every response.
Influencing the attitudes of all stakeholders and harness their insights
Reviewing and monitoring the outcome of stakeholder communications.
In order to harvest maximum input from stakeholders, a conducive environment should be offered where each stakeholder’s contribution is treated as important. Always there should be no long intervals of discussing a strategy which can easily create boredom.
Tools for environmental scanning that can identify potential program opportunities
Environmental scanning helps to focus on the anticipation for the future and thus causes the committee to forecast in different areas. The options or tools that can be used for environmental scanning includes the use of SWOT analysis to realize what potentials lie within and what to explore or the use of PESTLE tool in order to establish external trends but will neglect to check the district’s capacity. Another tool which is more effective for a school district environmental scanning is the SKEPTIC framework. This tool analyses the Socio-demographics(S), Competition (K), Environment and economics (E), Political and regulatory (P), Technology (T) ,Industry (I) and Customers (C) who in this case are the necessary people to help achieve an institutional meaningful plan (Castiglione, 2008).
Methods of assisting the committee to collect financial and demographic factors
The committee also needs criteria of collecting the financial and demographic factors including student-teacher ratios, costs of instruction as well as attendance rates monitoring. The committee will adopt the whole group instruction which provides students with a reduced student-teacher ratio. In this method, the tutor is supposed to give direct instruction to a whole group of learners. This will help analyze the performance of learners working towards the objectives and goals (Ross, 2008). Rapid assessment is cost-effective when it comes to cost of instructions than comprehensive school reform, cross-age tutoring, computer-assisted instruction, etc. For effective attendance rate monitoring, there are better methods to use than the traditional roll call method such as tracking of positivity ratio, creation of more positive school culture, the formation of an attendance team and early interventions (Vincent, n.d.).
Assessment of property value per child or assessment of funding sources
The school funding systems will ensure equal access to all core educational services while providing significant additional resources for low-income students. The student’s achievement and outcomes will serve as a check on the funding systems in the school. The strategic planning committee will ensure equity and fairness in the assignment of all resources per student.
Methods to generate a system to monitor progress
In order to effectively monitor progress towards achieving the strategic plan for Rochester heights school district, the planning committee should focus on;
Aligning each individual's objectives to suit those of the committee
Integrating strategic planning as a review process, not the development process
Rigorously engaging the community in the earliest of time possible
Cascading responsibilities by collaborative methods
Focusing entirely on executing and implementing the plan
(Soares, et.al, 2017).
References
Castiglione, J. (2008). Environmental scanning: an essential tool for twenty ‐ first century librarianship. Library Review , 57 (7), 528-536. doi:10.1108/00242530810894040
Establishing strategic goals, objectives, and tactics. (2016). Marketing Strategy for the Creative and Cultural Industries , 83-102. doi:10.4324/9781315691336-5
Ford, M. R., & Ihrke, D. M. (2019). School Board Member Strategic Planning Prioritization And School District Performance. Leadership and Policy in Schools , 1-13. doi:10.1080/15700763.2019.1638420
Jones, N., & Jones, E. B. (2017). Curriculum Initiatives and Pupil Achievement in Oxfordshire. Learning — to — Behave , 103-119. doi:10.4324/9781315831602-7
Ross, J. A. (2008). Cost–utility analysis in educational needs assessment. Evaluation and Program Planning , 31 (4), 356-367. doi:10.1016/j.evalprogplan.2008.06.003
Soares, D. A., George, C. C., & Vannest, K. J. (2017). Screening and Progress Monitoring in Secondary Schools. Oxford Clinical Psychology . doi:10.1093/med-psych/9780199352517.003.0012
Table D5.9a. (Web only) Means and methods for collecting and reporting data related to regulatory accountability for public schools (2009). (n.d.). doi:10.1787/888932465835
Vincent, T. J. (n.d.). School district improvement through strategic planning: A case study. doi:10.31274/rtd-180813-9675
