By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
The St. Joseph School District's Vision Forward Committee has held four community meetings this year that are open to the public, and the fifth and final one of the school year comes up Tuesday night
Bob Miller, one of the co-chairs on the Vision Forward Committee, says the amount of engagement and interest these meetings have gotten so far has been encouraging.
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The first Vision Forward meeting took place in January, with another in February, one on March 28th and the most recent on April 26 at Lafayette High School.
Tonight's meeting will be held at Benton from 6-8 p.m. The subject matter will be facilities for learning.
Miller says facilities has been one of the larger inequities within the district, especially within the middle schools.
"It's just not a very equitable system across the district," he said. "A lot of that is kind of shaped around facilities as we closed some elementary schools in certain parts of town. We've had to shift sixth graders to middle school buildings for space purposes."
Two of the district's middle schools educate sixth-eighth graders, while two others educate just seventh and eighth.
The previous four meetings have covered a wide variety of subjects, including how to recruit and retain quality staff, along with academic achievement and curriculum.
Vision Forward was formed in order to gather input from the public and share accurate information, with the hope of making better decisions for the city's schools.
Miller says the district tries to give people the most straightforward information at these meetings.
"We really strive to present really hard data," he said. "So that people are just really informed. A lot of times, people have opinions on things, but that's not always coming from an informed place. So, just want to make sure we're giving people the actual reality. Like, this is what it's like on the ground."
After Vision Forward meets tonight, the committee will meet with consulting firm 'Community Entourage' over the summer and present their findings.
The committee will then have another meeting this fall to present their findings to the public before any action items are put before the school board.
"Before it gets handed off to the board, we want to bring it back to the community one more time and say, 'Hey, did we get this right?' Miller said. "We want to make sure it's your voice and not just ours."
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