A couple of interesting ideas to emerge from last Friday's Green School conference at the Nittany Lion Inn came from the table conversation with other attendees. Among others, I spoke with Donnan Stoicovy, principal of Park Forest Elementary, who has long been an advocate for environmental responsibility coupled with student engagement. I came away more convinced of the importance of approaching "green" issues holistically. In particular, a lot could be gained by integrating our commitment to environmental responsibility with the district's wellness policy.For example, should we rethink the district's bussing policy, which currently provides transportation to elementary students who live more than one mile from school? (The secondary threshold is 1.5 miles; the state requirement is 1.5 miles and 2 miles, respectively.) Potentially, this could reduce vehicle emissions, save money, as well as give students a little more physical exercise.Should we be trying to purchase more locally grown food - or perhaps, try growing it ourselves, as part of the curriculum? In addition to the environmental impact (less pollution from transportation), and the potential for a healthier diet, what would be the educational impact of having students seeing their food is "made"? I suspect that our eating habits would change for the better overnight if our food production processes was more transparent.(In a related note, Slow Food USA’s Central PA chapter recently announced a Labor Day “Eat In” to be held from 3-5pm at the Panorama Elementary School. The community pot-luck is in support of Slow Food’s goal of “getting real food into school lunches.”) There are also clear benefits to actively involving students in these decisions, both for the educational value, as well as for the increased sense of student engagement in the school community. One presenter showed us four short student-made videos that were produced to encourage environmental awareness within their school. Locally, first and second graders at Park Forest recently took on the challenge of reducing paper towel consumption. - this involved some impressive math - resulting in "One or two will do" stickers being placed on every towel dispenser. Additional ideas can be found at the Center for Ecoliteracy.
Readers: what follows is the second half of the report I gave to the Board last night. It's an extension of my April 13th post on "Professional Learning Communities"One of the presentations I attended at NSBA's April conference was by a school district that – like State College - was facing the imperative of significant renovations to their high school facility. Marysville School District in Washington state decided this was an opportunity for them to re-vision what a 21st century high school might look like.With a guiding committee of about 50 teachers, parents and students, Marysville began by brainstorming a "day in the life" of a high school student. This lead to the establishment of a set of guiding principles.The central principal centered on relationships.
I thought it might be useful for my readers to have the unabridged version – you can’t print everything - of my comments to the CDT in regards to its recent story on the school district’s 09/10 budget.My concern is that we're putting a lot of unnecessary effort and administrative time into preparing for a worst-case scenario that is highly unlikely. Every state budget is a negotiation, and as I said at the last board meeting, my guess is that the eventual state appropriation is likely to be closer to the governor's proposal (which would result in a net gain to the district of about $200,000) than to what the senate passed and which the house rejected (which would have resulted in a net loss of $600,000). The most likely outcome, therefore, is that we’ll have to cover a shortfall of $100,000-200,000. (Keep in mind that the Governor has a pretty good track record of getting what he wants.)In the proposed budget, we have already set aside $3 million from our fund balance in preparation for the spike in the mandated contribution to PSERS that will be occurring in 2012-2013. That still leaves us with over $500,000 above and beyond the 5% that has been established by board policy - more than enough to cover any shortfall from the state. In fact, these unexpected situations are precisely the reason that you have a fund balance. While there are savings to be found in any budget, significant cost-cutting should be approached thoughtfully, deliberatively, and with consideration for all the implications. This is especially true if we are dealing with a long-term issue, which appears likely. In my opinion, this is not something we should be trying to do in the twenty days we have left to pass this year’s budget. The long-term solution: a change in the fiscal calendar that would let school districts know the state appropriation well before they have to pass their budget. This also seems highly unlikely, but Senator Corman has indicated that he’s willing to consider it.
