During its meeting on Thursday, January 18, the Livingston Public Schools Board of Education discussed the results of its recent equity audit of the district. Board members shared their ideas on how to apply the audit’s recommendations into practice.
At the beginning of the meeting, superintendent of schools Matthew Block stated that meetings with administrators, advisors, and equity coaches in regards to the audit, are being conducted.
“We’ve met with the anti-bullying specialists, as well as implementation teams of administrators and supervisors,” he said. Child study teams are also scheduled to meet this month, and parents of the building equity team will have an opportunity to have a conversation with their coaches during their scheduled meetings this month.
During the meeting sessions with administrators, supervisors, and other staff, Block stated that the groups worked together to incorporate the recommendations posted in the initial audit, using the recommendations under the categories of: academics; climate and culture for students; climate and culture for staff, community, and family; community collaboration; and general diversity, equity, and inclusion items.
“We took each element and asked each group from each meeting to go around the room and think of the action items that they could come up with for short term, for slightly longer term, and then for long term.” Block said.
One short term action item on Block’s list included having gifted and talented and other level courses’ descriptions, and how to get into those courses on the website. A long term action on his list was looking at the district’s grading system and how students are informed about it.
Further into the meeting, Board member Seth Cohen stated that he was concerned about the path that the Board was taking.
“I’m fearful we’re headed down the same path we’ve been on,” he said, “Look at the feedback in the equity report and more the full report, less the addendum. The thing I took away when we had Doctor Zion present, was ‘inconsistent and disconnected’... What I fear is if we’re talking about tactics already, we’re missing the strategic element. We’re missing the overarching part that’s missing. What are we trying to achieve with our equity audit?”
After hearing feedback and concerns from the board, Block agreed with the sentiments.
“I hear the feedback that we may have jumped in at step two or step three, as opposed to step one,” Block said. “The district goal is to engage all stakeholders, families, students, and guardians in educational programs, essentially creating community in our school district and to ensure just outcomes for each student, raise marginal voices, and challenge imbalances of power and privilege.”
The Board agreed to have a thirdparty facilitator help guide further discussions about equity. Although the district has already established an equity committee, Board members agreed on expanding the committee to become community-wide, with stakeholders throughout the town being involved. This, they said, would involve a facilitator guiding the meetings. They also agreed that the facilitator should have experience in diversity, equity, and inclusion, and have an unbiased view of the conversations while engaging in the meetings of the community-wide equity audit team.
“Just as we went and selected Long Range Facilities Planning Committee members, I think we should just employ the same method and come up with a plan of how we get that team together,” said Board member Parul Khemka.
The Board planned to continue these discussions at a later date. Audit overseer Shelley Zion, will be presenting results from the recently conducted addendum during the Board’s next meeting, on Tuesday, February 6. [email protected], and Robert Bucich, who may be contacted at [email protected].
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