Moving away from PTA discussed at BOE Committee meeting

Thanks to parent Danuta Wilson for attending this Board of Education committee meeting. These meetings are not recorded and not available on video.  It is only when citizens volunteer their time to attend these committee meetings that the public finds out what the Board of Education is planning.

At the September 27, 2012, Board of Education Communications and Public Engagement Committee meeting I found two topics of interest:

Dana Tofig outlined a new initiative called Neighbor to Neighbor that MCPS will be launching on October 8, 2012. The goal is to engage the public in self-guided small group discussions on a variety of topics. The first topic will be the MCPS Operating Budget. To help with the discussions there will be a website, tool kit and other ways to communicate with MCPS throughout the process and to ask questions. MCPS will be aggressively reaching out to non-profits, community organizations, Parent Advisory Council, etc to seek feedback. The notes from the various meetings will be shared with the Superintendent and the Board of Education and there will be a report on the input received.

Another topic had to do with visits to cluster schools by the Superintendent and the Board of Education. This is in addition to cluster visits that have already been scheduled. Brian Edwards said that the goal was to move away from the traditional PTA managed visits and instead to build a grassroots network. I like this idea a lot and would love to see it in practice. I look forward to hearing more about it.
 
Danuta Wilson

Agenda Communication Public Engagement