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News
Plans for school advisory committees detailed : News : Oswego Ledger-Sentinel : Hometown Newspaper for Oswego and Montgomery, IllinoisPlans for school advisory committees detailed
| Panels to study school finances, instruction, facilities and policy development
| by Lyle R. Rolfe
| 10/25/2012
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Oswego School District Superintendent Dr. Matthew Wendt explained his plans for four advisory committees at a recent school district board meeting.
Wendt also announced a registration deadline for district residents who wish to serve on the first two committees-Operations and Finance and Teaching and Learning.
The four committees and issues in the district they will examine are as follows:
Finance and Operations will consider district finances, operations and business practices.
Teaching and Learning will consider curriculum, staff development, student achievement and other similar topics.
Facilities and Planning will address long-range planning for facilities and other elements of facility development and construction, including student enrollment planning and projection, building capacity and utilization and district boundaries.
Policy Development will review policy, recommend changes and oversee a review cycle of board policies, including student handbooks.
Wendt said applicants will be asked why they want to serve on one of the committees and to list their qualities, knowledge and/or experiences that will result in them being a good committee member.
Wendt said he hopes the Operations and Finance and Teaching and Learning committees will be ready to hold their first meetings in mid-to-late November and the other two committees can hold their sessions in January or February.
The district must receive applications for the Teaching and Learning and Finance and Operations committees by Friday, Nov. 2.
Information forms for all four committees are available online at oswego308.org or at the District 308 Administrative Center, 4175 Route 71 in Oswego.
Wendt said they are asking applicants for their name, residential and email addresses, telephone numbers and then three additional questions.
_He explained they want to know if the applicants have children attending district schools and if so what schools and grades.
"This is important information for us to use to keep from having an imbalance of members from the same schools and grade levels. We need a good mixture of elementary, junior and high school parents," he said.
The second question, he said, is if the applicants are district employees, while the third question asks the applicants who their current employer is.
"We need a good balance of staff members, so it's important to know if the applicant is a certified or non-certified staff member and whether they are working in an elementary or secondary school or other facility," he said.
Wendt said committee meetings will be held monthly during early evenings and will start between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.
He suggested up to two board members serve on each committee and said a board member should be a co-facilitator for each group.
One of the board members from each committee will be asked to report to the board on their previous meeting.
He said several people who want to serve on the Operations and Finance Committee already have contacted the district.
Wendt said the PTO organizations have been notified that the district is looking for volunteers.
He said they are planning to have a minimum of 15 people on each committee but would like to have 25 on each if possible. This would give them an additional 80 to 100 voices giving opinions on the various committees, he added.
Wendt noted that these are not the superintendent's or administration committees.
The meetings will be open to the public and will be held in accordance with an agenda to be put together in advance. All meetings will be recorded so official minutes can be kept and posted, he said.
Every committee will be told that they will not get everything they may want, he said.
Each committee at its first meeting will be asked to determine who should serve for one, two, and three year terms.
Board member Dave Behrens said he believes they need ground rules for the committee members.
Wendt said he has talked to other communities and added that the first meetings would be to review the rules.
"The committees will not replace the board. You will be talking to each other," he said.
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