Friday’s first”Office Hours with the Superintendent” at Hugo Coffee, was a huge success. Approximately 10 people showed up to spend an hour with Park City School District Superintendent Dr. Ember Conley. It was a very informal gathering where people took turns asking questions and providing input. The major topics discussed included:

• A citizen wanted to know how the district was handling dyslexia. The discussion turned into how hard it is to diagnose. It sounds like a family may be donating money to help our schools with the problem but nothing has been formally announced yet.
• Dr Conley stressed that the district’s budget, and therefore plans, are fluid. They are using the best current information to make decisions but are changing course when necessary.
• Dr Conley said “If I have a pot of money and I can hire one teacher or two aides, I’d hire the teacher.” She said she knew this isn’t always a popular stance but it is how she feels.
• The school district isn’t projecting high growth in the number of students in the near future.
• The school board will start talking about Master Plan again during Tuesday’s all day retreat.
• The school board’s retreat is open to the public and starts at 9AM on Tuesday, March 15.
• The district has estimated there are at least $500,000 in repairs needed for TMJH. One of the biggest issues is corroded pipes.
• Everyone likes idea of 9th grade going back into the high school. Dr Conley cited the students survey and said it had lots of funny comments but also supported bringing 9th graders back into
• A citizen brought up the question of “why not using professionals to teach reading?”. Dr. Conley responded with part of her approach to achieving better reading:
  • Build capacity with teachers including differentiated learning.
  • She provided an example where a teacher used technology where the teacher can stop quizzes if a large percentage of kids do poorly on a question and provide more instruction at that point.
  • She cited a concept called Double Dose where during the first 30-45 minutes of school, kids are grouped by ability. So, a Kindergartener may be with 2nd graders in a certain subject. It provides more focused learning in areas where either students need additional instruction or like the subject. She also cited this is where PE teachers and arts teachers may teach reading in different ways than are traditionally taught (i.e. perhaps learning reading through dance). She said Parley’s Park had successfully done this process.
  • Starting 2016-2017 all schools will do this “All hands on deck” concept.
• A citizen asked “What’s the program/strategy for kids who can’t read at all?”
  • Dr Conley said all Reading Specialists will have master degrees. The citizen, who had been a teacher, and appeared to have a Master’s Degree in Reading responded that the current job description is not good enough for the Reading Specialist. Dr Conley said all the reading Specialist had been hired but that a job description can never describe everything a person will actually need to do. The citizen also pointed out that teachers have not been trained in intervention. She questioned whether the teachers were ready for this change in a few months. She suggested waiting a year.
  • Dr Conley also said teachers should be able to handle 16 kids without an aide. If not, there was a problem.
  • Dr Conley said that she has not had a teacher come to her with a complaint about this that could not be rectified.
• “Office Hours” closed with a discussion of a legislative change where $800K of our district’s money will be going to charter schools. Dr Conley stated that they are looking at how they can move money around to account for this change.

Overall, it was some of the best time I’ve spent with members of our school system. Office Hours provides an intimate setting where you not only get answers to questions but you also get to talk face to face. I’m a huge proponent of social media and the ability to discuss topics asynchronously and when it’s convenient. However, this meeting reminded me of the power of sitting down with those people you have questions of in person.

If you have any questions about our School District…. even if it is, “how does my kid get into Stanford?” you’re not going to get a better opportunity than this. I hope everyone takes an opportunity between now and the end of May (when this program is done) to sit down with the Superintendent.

This morning, Park city School District Superintendent Dr Ember Conley held her first “office hours” and it was a tremendous success. She invited anyone from the community to Hugo Coffee at 8:30 to discuss any topic they were interested in. I’ll have more info on what was discussed later, but I would recommend that anyone who has questions about our schools to attend next Friday’s “Office hours” at 8:30 AM at Hugo Coffee.

You’re not going to get more direct access to the Superintendent than this. You may not always like the response to the question, but you’ll get one. That’s pretty good in our book.

Yes, I have been critical of the School District in the past. Will I be as critical going forward? Probably.

Yet, I have to admit that whoever came up with Superintendent Ember Conley having office hours at Hugo Coffee on Fridays is pure genius. According to the Park Record, Dr Conley will be at Hugo Coffee on Fridays, through May, from 8:30 AM to 9:30 AM to answer questions from citizens.

My first question is, “What’s a professional learning community?” Just kidding, I think she’s explained that 20 times on KPCW. I think this is a great move. I’ll be there Friday to see how this is shaping up.

Good move school district.

Last week the Park Rag received an anonymous tip instructing us to look at a post entitled Goodbye Journalism on a blog called Treasure Mountain Junior High Park City Post. The post indicated that Journalism class, as well as other well-like electives were being taken away for the 2016-2017 school year. According to the post, “Taking its place is a new schedule, which includes morning I-Time, a 25-minute study session.”

With the topic being journalism, of course we were interested. While deciding to be a journalist as a career is currently a tough road to hoe, journalism classes teach valuable skills like writing, criticism, logic, and interpersonal skills. The post author also stated that she is concerned that:

• Replacing real classes with I-Time should no longer be needed once someone hits 8th grade.
• If the school holds kids hands with programs like I-time, instead of classes, students will not learn how to do things for themselves.
• Electives provide something “fun” to do at school, and that is needed.
• There is already an after school help lab, to assist students who have questions
• Students that may be interested in Journalism will not have an opportunity to try it out.

We reached out to the school district and spoke with TMJH Principal Emily Sutherland to ask about these changes. Ms. Sutherland told us that the expansion of I-Time had nothing to do with cancelling classes. She stated that Journalism was not being offered next terms because it was not growing and was not “hugely popular.” She said the school district is attempting to align all classes with CTE Pathways (Career and Technical Education Pathways). According to the district’s website “CTE provides courses and pathways consistent with industry standards. Exploratory courses begin in the 7th grade, and subsequent courses teach students specific job readiness and job skills, which can lead to employment and post secondary education.”

Ms. Sutherland also indicated they were always tinkering with classes offered and said they are planning on adding the following classes next year:

• Public Speaking and Broadcasting
• Exploring Computer Science
• Another Level of Biology
• Additional Dual Language Immersion opportunities

So, it appears that this change, while unfortunate for those students who love Journalism class, has been thought out. If classes had to be cut, we wish it could have been something else beside Journalism; however, it seems the district is not cutting classes to simply add an independent study.

We hope in the future that there will be enough interest to force the school district to offer the class again. Until that time, if you are a student, and want to work on something close to real Journalism, we’d love to have you write for the Park Rag. We have no money but we have lots of ideas. Send us an email if you are interested.

Something I have heard repeatedly is that the Park City School District is the #1 school district in the state. It reminds me of those old Enterprise Car Rental commercials. You’d see some guy proclaim that Enterprise was #1… they pick you up!

But, regardless of the spin, you really knew that Hertz was #1.

This weekend, I decided to dig into the claim by the school district that it was #1. What I came away with is while the Park City School District may like to declare itself number #1, and this may be true at an aggregate level, individual grade level results paint the picture of a good, but not perfect, school district.

For weeks, maybe months, I have heard the claim that we were the best district in the state. I had reviewed the standardized test score numbers and I couldn’t figure out exactly how we were the best. Then today I was searching for something else and up popped a documents entitled, “District Narrative.” This Park City School District document explained that according to SAGE test results our district overall was #1 in English Language Arts. Yet, I had previously looked at SAGE test results and never saw our schools as the top performer.

I decided it was worth a second look. Here is where our schools stand at each grade level:

• 10th grade English we are 10th in the state.
• 9th grade English we are 36th in the state
• 8th Grade English we are 48th in the state
• 7th Grade English we are 28th in the state
• 6th Grade English we are 66th in the state
• 5th Grade English, our best school (Jeremy Ranch Elementary), was 20th in the state
• 4th Grade English, our best school (Jeremy Ranch), was 4th in the state. Trailside was 5th.
• 3rd Grade English, our best school (Parley’s Park), was 61st in the state.

So, perhaps we are the best district by some cumulative measure; however, I wouldn’t be glowing, as our district is doing, about any results beyond 4th Grade English and perhaps 10th grade English. In fact Weilenman Charter School ranks about 20 places ahead of our schools in 3rd grade English. That said, I’m not sure what weight to put on standardized tests when I consider consider educational success, but since the Park City School District markets our SAGE test as “Park City is #1, I guess I’ll go with it.

Gut feeling tells me that Park City schools are better than average.Yet, when I hear the spin that “Park City School District” is the best in the state and “now we need to be the best in the country,” it gives me pause. “Best in State” makes it sound like we are clearly better than everyone else at everything. Looking at individual grades, it looks like in many cases we have a lot of work to do.

In case you are interested, here is the spreadsheet of 2015 SAGE results.

In a previous post about the Park City School Board, I asked the question “Should Community Opinion Matter to the Park City School Board?.” In the comments section, that article somewhat devolved into a discussion of whether the school board/district should have to watch social media and should the public expect that comments made on social media are “answered” by the powers that be.

First, I’ll state my opinion… Do I ever expect that City/County Managers, Council Persons, Planning Commissioners, government employees, school board members, etc. ever read The Park Rag? Absolutely not. I’m honored when they do. However, If I don’t email them, or show up at a meeting and say something, I have no expectation of any sort of response. Heck, even when I email, I have no expectation of response. Maybe other opinions vary.

However, that does not mean that social media does not matter (sorry for the double negative when talking about school related topics).

In days before Facebook and Next Door, when blogs were not prevalent, and the word tweet made people think of the song “Rocking Robin”, did people care about their community? Of course they did. How did they express those concerns? They voiced them to neighbors. They voiced them to friends on the phone. The talked about the issues in coffee shops. The difference was that there was no “network.” The conversation ended with your friend Sue. Sue’s friend Tom never heard it. Tom’s friend Jim never heard it. However, in today’s networked world, many people hear it.

That’s the problem when members of a group like the Park City School board dismiss “social media” out of hand. They think it’s Ok to say thing like, “How are we supposed to respond to comments on social media? Unless you email me directly or say it to my face, I won’t hear it.” That line of thinking is that of a RELIC.

Social media is not a new thing. This great post by Ben Thompson sums up social media during the last 8 YEARS. He highlights comments made by Clay Shirky who summarizes just how social media has taken over politics in the last half decade:

Social media is breaking the political ‘Overton Window’ — the ability of elites to determine the outside edges of acceptable conversation (link). These limits were enforced by party discipline, and mass media whose economics meant political centrism was the best way to make money (link). This was BC: Before Cable. One or two newspapers per town, three TV stations; all centrist, white, pro-business, respectful of authority (link). Cable changed things, allowing outsiders to campaign more easily. In ’92, Ross Perot, 3rd party candidate, campaigned through infomercials (link).

After Cable but Before Web lasted only a dozen years. Cable added a new stream of media access. The web added a torrent (link). This started with Howard Dean (the OG) in ’03. Poverty was the mother of invention; Dean didn’t have enough $ to buy ads, even on cable (link) but his team had Meetup & blogs… (link). After webifying Perot’s media tactics, Dean pioneered online fundraising. Unfortunately for him, his Get Out The Vote operation didn’t (link). That took Obama. Obama was less of an outsider than Dean (though still regarded as unelectable in ’07) but used most of Dean’s playbook (link). And then there was vote-getting. Facebook and MyBarackObama let the Obama campaign run their own vote-getting machine out of Chicago (link).

The new scale Facebook introduces into politics is this: all registered American voters, ~150M people, are now a medium-sized group (link). Reaching & persuading even a fraction of the electorate used to be so daunting that only two national orgs could do it. Now dozens can (link). This set up the current catastrophe for the parties. They no longer control any essential resource, and can no longer censor wedge issues (link)

While I realize the above quote is talking national politics, it’s not that different for local affairs. While the city and county fiddle about solving transportation issues, I’ve heard about (but not seen, to be fair) that there is a Facebook group that tells each other about real time traffic problems around Park City. If you want to hear about important issues that happened in a school board meeting late on Tuesday, does the Saturday Park Record give you what you need to know in a timely basis? Maybe but you’ll probably find a post the day after the meeting on NextDoor telling you about something you should be aware of.

More importantly, if our leaders are not paying attention to public opinion, they are missing out. If the school board looks out into the “audience” at a meeting and sees six eyes, four of which are reporters for KPCW and the Park Record, they should know that the community still cares about many of the issues. People just don’t have the time to attend meetings in person. They may catch up on meetings by watching video (which the school district does a great job of) or by hearing from friends on social media about the issue. If a person then has an opinion, they will then likely express that on the medium in which they learned about it: Twitter, NextDoor, Facebook, etc.

So, should our School Board and school district administrators spend their time scouring social media for public comments, so that they can answer them? Of course not.

Should they be aware that social media impacts a large proportion of the public’s view on issues that are important to the school board? Of course.

Government officials that ignore social media do so at their own peril.

While this issue has morphed over time, I recall hearing on KPCW that top district personnel hadn’t heard anything negative from teachers about removing reading aides from our classroom. I’ll say that I have heard comments from both teachers and reading aides about this change via social media. They aren’t happy. Given that, who looks more informed? A guy writing a “blog” or those in charge of our schools.

That is why social media is important.