MEMORANDUM

TO: Board of Directors

THROUGH: Superintendent

FROM: Tanya Rowe, Director of Communications and Community Relations

DATE: Dec. 20, 2011

RE: Monitoring Report for EL- 12, Communication with the Public and EL-3, Treatment of Parents, Students and the Public

I certify that the following is accurate as of Dec. 20, 2011. The reporting period is from Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011. Policy Type: Executive Limitation

Policy: EL-12 Community Communication “…The Superintendent shall not fail to prepare and execute a

community/public relations plan…” (A copy of the policy is attached.)

EL-3 Treatment of Parents, Students and the Public “…The Superintendent shall not fail to ensure that parents, students

and the public are treated with respect and dignity at the district level and within each school and classroom…”

Adopted: September 10, 2009

Interpretation of items: None in question. EL-12 has three major areas: 1. Community/Public Relations 2. Annual Progress Reports 3. Strategic Plan

Monitoring Report for ELs 3 and -12

2

Description of Evidence of Compliance: The 2011-12 Communications Plan is a management document developed and utilized by the Department of Communications and Community Relations. It includes an evaluation of last year’s plan, research and analysis, SMART goals, performance indicators, responsibilities, timelines, and a monitoring report of major tasks. The attached or linked data and information come from the plan’s performance indicators and provide evidence that the superintendent is in compliance with ELs-3 and 12: • District and school usage of SchoolMessenger, our phone, email and text communication

tool with parents/guardians and our community (see Data Charts 1, 2, 3 and 4) • Receipt of SchoolMessenger communications (see Data Chart 5) • Publications by the Department of Communications and Community Relations (see

Data Chart 6) • Presentations and special events (see Data Chart 7) • Videos viewed by stakeholders (see Data Chart 8) • Digital Communications Scorecard (see Data Chart 9) • School Performance Reports were published online and distributed to district families.

These reports are used to share highlights of progress, plans for improvement, school marketing information, data, and also help satisfy some of the annual federally- and state- mandated notification/legal reporting requirements. These reports include additional Adequate Yearly Progress and School Choice information for parents at Title I schools in Steps of Improvement. We decided not to print a District Annual Report this fall. Instead, we are in the process of moving this data online in a scorecard-type format on our website for public view. It will be a transitional process for this data conversion until the district has developed and implemented an online scorecard reporting tool.

• The district’s financial condition is reported in the budget book that is distributed to media representatives and anyone who requests the information. The annual budget is published on the district website: http://bellinghamschools.org/businessandoperations, along with regular budget updates: http://bellinghamschools.org/budgetprocess2012

• Each year, Executive Team members compile a list of district committees and the membership composition of those groups, for which calls for applications are publicized and the work is shared online at http://bellinghamschools.org/committeesandtaskforces Furthermore, the superintendent engages stakeholders continuously through a number of groups that meet regularly including Student Advisory Council and Parent Advisory Council.

• Dr. Baker is using his Entry Plan process to provide a bridge to our next strategic planning cycle during the 2011-12 school year: http://bellinghamschools.org/strategicplan. Beginning in January 2012, we will share a draft of The Bellingham Promise with our stakeholders to gather further input and shape the next version of a “living” strategic plan document.

• In summer 2011, we conducted a scientific community survey as a follow-up to the 2010 survey. Please see the enclosed summary as prepared by a third party. This data, along with many other sources of input, is being used to help drive our 2011-12 Communications Plan and will be used by the superintendent to help guide future strategic planning and decision-making.

Monitoring Report for ELs 3 and -12

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• Administrative policies 4020, 4020P and 4020F (scheduled for finalization in January 2012) provide an update and clarification to our current process for the effective handling of complaints.

• The district abides by federal and state law, including the Family Educational and Privacy Act (FERPA), to protect confidential information as demonstrated by our administrative policies and procedures: https://bellinghamschools.org/administrativepoliciesandprocedures

• EL-3 Item 5 addresses a nutritious school meal program: Every day during the school year, the Food Services Department serves more than 1,600 breakfasts and 4,600 lunches to students and staff. During the 2010-11 school year, the program served 1.1 million meals. The Food Services Department has a staff of 72 located at 23 different locations throughout the district. It is the only self-funded program within the district and has a mandate to achieve a break-even status every year (see Data Charts 10-12).

Statement of Compliance: The superintendent is in compliance with EL-3 and EL-12.

Community Survey Executive Summary A total of 382 respondents were interviewed between July 12-15, 2011. The margin of error for this survey is +/-5.0% at the 95% level of confidence. 1. Slightly less than half of respondents believe things in Bellingham School District are

going in the right direction. When comparing current results to those from 2010, there has been a slight decrease in the number of respondents who believe Bellingham Public Schools are off on the wrong track.

2. A large percentage of respondents give Bellingham School District a positive performance

rating. Current results remain relatively consistent with those from 2010.

3. Primary reasons for giving the district a positive performance rating are “personal experience,” “room for improvement,” “they are doing a good job” and “from what I’ve heard/read.”

4. Principal reasons for giving the district a negative performance rating are “students don’t get a good education,” “room for improvement” and “personal experience.”

5. Respondents list “quality of staff” as the best thing about Bellingham School District,

followed by “other” responses and “curriculum.” 6. “Other” criticisms are listed as the biggest criticism heard about Bellingham Public

Schools, followed by “no criticisms.” 7. Top “other” criticisms include “too many administrators,” “funding cuts” and “poor

quality teachers.” 8. Respondents say they are most interested in school district information regarding

“academic progress,” followed by “other” information.

Monitoring Report for ELs 3 and -12

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9. Slightly over half of respondents give the school district a positive rating when it comes to

how the district spends the money it receives. Current results remain relatively consistent with those from 2010.

10. Foremost reasons for giving district spending a positive rating are “doing pretty good,” “room for improvement” and “do their best with what they have.”

11. Main reasons for giving school district spending a negative rating are “overpaid administration,” “room for improvement” and “poor money management.”

12. In addition, well over half of respondents believe the district spends about the right amount of money. Again, current results remain consistent with those from 2010.

13. Slightly over half of respondents believe the district offers adequate opportunities for participation from district staff, students, parents and stakeholders before making crucial education decisions. Once again, current results remain relatively consistent with those from 2010.

14. Furthermore, a large number of respondents believe citizen participation has influenced School Board decisions. When comparing current results to those from 2010, there has been a significant increase in the number of respondents who believe citizen participation has influenced School Board decisions.

In conclusion, the community in general appears to have a positive view of Bellingham School District as reflected in overall and more specific performance ratings. In addition, respondents have a positive perception about how the district is spending money, and a majority of respondents believe they pay about the right amount of taxes for their local school district. Furthermore, it appears respondents have an improved perception about community participation and its influence on School Board decisions.

DATA CHART 1

District Usage of SchoolMessenger, Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011

Types of Messages General Outreach

Total Phone Messages DeliveredEmergency 10,587Attendance 77,442General Outreach 128,445School Act./Athletics 1,783Early AM Closure/Delay 9,843

228,100

Total E-mail Messages DeliveredEmergency 1,653Attendance 2General Outreach 147,195School Act./Athletics 54Early AM Closure/Delay 16,737

165,641

Total SMS (text) Messages Delivered Total: 176Emergency 736 Number of Messages Sent through SchoolMessenger (phone, phone/email, email only)

Attendance 0General Outreach 1,942 * Examples of other types of messages include information about

School Act./Athletics 0 teaching and learning, springboard proposals to share ideas and gather input, committees,

Early AM Closure/Delay 4,880 farm-to-school program, etc…7,558

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45

Facilities Updates

Transportation Issues

Budget Updates

Labor issues

Good News

School Board (meeting notices, linkages)

Staffing updates/feedback

Calendar

Weather/Emergency

Information-Other*

School Usage of SchoolMessenger, Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011 DATA CHART 2

Elementary Schools

SCHOOL

Number of School Messages Sent through SchoolMessenger (phone, phone/email/text, email only)

Stephanie Korn, Alderwood Elementary School Principal"SchoolMessenger has been an excellent resource for helping us connect and communicate with our diverse population. We use SchoolMessenger for a variety of communication purposes. Our messages are sent on the phone, text messages and email and are translated into multiple languages. Each month, we remind families in multiple languages about our monthly family engagement opportunities, including PTA meetings and ELL familymeetings. We remind our community about upcoming special events such as our Dolphin Dash and Family Literacy Nights. We email key communications to our families, like our school newsletter each month. SchoolMessenger allows us to connect directly with parents in their native language, rather than relying on fliers sent home with students in only one language. SchoolMessenger has increased our participation and engagement of our families."

0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35

Alderwood

Birchwood

Carl Cozier

Columbia

Cordata

Geneva

Happy Valley

Larrabee

Lowell

Northern Heights

Parkview

Roosevelt

Silver Beach

Sunnyland

Wade King

School Usage of SchoolMessenger, Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011 DATA CHART 3

Middle Schools

SCHOOL

Number of School Messages Sent through SchoolMessenger (phone, phone/email/text, email only)

Michelle Kuss-Cybula, Fairhaven Middle School Principal:"We have found that communicating with families is so much more convenient … Our parents are now so used to the system that they look forward to the e-mail announcing our newsletter every few weeks… We also use SchoolMessenger for grade level "groups."Our 7 th grade team wanted to send a newsletter regarding important student-led conference information.With SchoolMessenger, we were able to sort the students into a 7 th grade group and get the message to these families in a timelyand efficient manner, thus avoiding paper copies, which generally never make it home to parents anyway.”

* Aug. 1, 2011 to Nov. 30, 2011

0 5 10 15 20 25 30

Fairhaven

Kulshan

Shuksan

Whatcom*

School Usage of SchoolMessenger, Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011 DATA CHART 4

High Schools

SCHOOL

Number of School Messages Sent through SchoolMessenger (phone, phone/email/text, email only)

0 5 10 15 20 25

Bellingham

Options

Sehome

Squalicum

Parent/Guardian Recipients of SchoolMessenger Messages DATA CHART 5

Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011

Type Dec. 2010 Nov. 2011

Phones 7,480* 7,480* *Based on all famiies registered in district (10,714) minus duplicates (3,234),

Emails Only 2,276 3,785 according to a Sept. 1, 2011 SchoolMessenger report

Goal for 2011-12: Increase the e-mail numbers to 5,000 by June 2012 for improved school/district-to-home communication.

Strategies: • Work with school office staff to locate existing email lists (classroom and team-based, PTA lists, etc.) and load into system.• Work with principals to identify families without an email address in the system; write letter home to remind families of the process to manage their preferences; and/or retrieve workable emails from these families and have school staff load them into system.

Community/No Children in School Recipients of School Messenger MessagesDec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011

Type CountEmail only 181

Goal for 2011-12: Increase key communicator email recipients from 181 to 250.

Strategies: • Add notice in InsideSchools Community Newsletter with contact information on how to sign up for community e-news.• Contact community organizations such as the Senior Center and the Boys and Girls Club, and School Board community linkage attendees, to ask if they'd like to join the distribution list.• Contact WWU Woodring staff/student body to see if they'd like to join the distribution list.

DATA CHART 6

Publications by the Department of Communications and Community Relations Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011

Type Count Distribution Translated*Family Handbook (July 2011) 11,000 All families and staff, SM, posted22 School Performance Reports (Aug through Dec. 2011) 22 All families and staff, SM, posted 1 SMSSpringboard Proposal: Facilities (Dec. 2010) 1,200 Affected elementary schools/families xSpringboard Proposal: School Start and End Times (March, 2011) 4,500 Elementary families xListening and Learning: Entry Plan Report (Jan. 2011) 1,000 Office copies at schools, SM, posted xAnnual Report (Dec. 2010) 500 Mostly webInsideSchools Community Newsletter (3X annually) 55,000 Citywide householdsReady Guide 2011 (Feb. 2011 7,000 Grade 6 to 11 families, mailed x Calendar Magnet (Sept. 2011) 8,500 All families and staff x Weather/Emergency Flyer 2011 (Oct. 2011) 7,500 All families, mailed x Staff Weather Information 2011 (Oct. 2011) 1,300 All staff, intranetOrganizational Chart (Nov. 2011) NA Posted on webNews (Ongoing) 127 Posted on web Google translate avail.

Charitable Giving Campaign documents (Oct. 2011) 1,300 All staffFAFSA Financial Aid Postcards (Nov. 2011) 2 All grade 12 students x Bus Schedule Change Flyers (Sept. 2011) 1 All families x Bus Information for Kindergarten Families (Aug. 2011) 750 Kindergarten families x Bus Route Mailing and Letter (Aug. 2011) 6,900 One per family x Retirement Dinner program (April 2011) 110 Attendees to dinnerMessages from Dr. Baker to Staff (Ongoing) 44 All district staff

*Increasing communication with our families whose home language is not English has been a departmental focus.Since fall 2010, we have substantially increased the ways we are communicating in Spanish, Vietnamese and Russian.Department staff work slose with the the Special Assistant to the Superintendent on Family Engagement, the EnglishLanguage Learners' Program Administrator, and interpreters/translators.

DATA CHART 7

Presentations and Special Events, Dec. 1 through Nov. 30, 2011

Type Event Date Attendees DistributionEntry Plan Learnings Presentation 1/27/2011 400 staff (est.) All families, staff, web, BTV10Retirement Dinner 4/28/2011 110

New Principals/Leaders Input Sessions Larrabee 5/10/2011Columbia 5/10/2011Silver Beach 5/11/2011Geneva 5/11/2011Bellingham 5/18/2011Shuksan 5/23/2011

Budget Presentations 7/7/2011, Board Mtg. NA All families, staff, web, BTV10

Whatcom Middle School Re-Opening 9/1/2011 800 (est.)Cordata Elementary School Grand Opening 9/8/2011 200 (est.)

Back to School Kick Off Event 9/2/2011 Cancelled

DATA CHART 8

District Videos Produced Dec. 1, 2010 through Nov. 30, 2011Views

Full-Time Kindergarten (Jan. 2011) 2,354Entry Plan Learning (Jan. 2011) 1,986Start and End Times (March 2011) 2,344Improving our Graduation Rate (June 2011) 955Budget Priorities (July 2011) 543Annual Awards/Celebrating Schools (Aug. 2011) 1,037Great Start! (Sept. 2011) 3,347

Number of Views onSchoolTube

In addition, all videos are aired

on BTV-10, the public access

television channel.

Name of Video and Month Produced

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

Digital Communications Scorecard

Web Communication with the Public

Website usage Source: Google Analytics

In June 2011, Bellingham Public Schools completed a two-year project to provide every school in the district with a website. The last school website went live in fall 2011. In November 2011, the Department of Communications and Community Relations implemented a system for statistics gathering for individual school websites. This will provide a baseline for monitoring future use of school websites. Our goal is to monitor web usage trends throughout each school year.

November 1, 2011 through November 30, 2011

Web usage statistics for the district website during the month of November show 61,628 unique visits and more than 150,000 page views. The most popular pages for viewing, beside the district homepage, is the page for email access (used by staff), the online staff directory, employment page, school contacts page, district calendars, etc. The daily webpage visits data shows a wave pattern where visits are frequent during the school week and less frequent during weekends. November also shows few visits on the 24th and 25th, the Thanksgiving holiday. Average daily pageviews for during school days for the district office website hover around 6,500.

DATA CHART 9

DATA CHART 10 Nutritious Meals Information School lunches must meet federal guidelines based on the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

• Lunches are served in age-appropriate portion sizes and provide the right balance of protein, dairy, whole grains, fruits and vegetables. The complete meal must fall within the mandated calorie guidelines set by grade level.

• Each lunch must provide one-third of the Recommended Dietary Allowances of protein, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, iron, calcium, and calories.

• Less than 30 percent of the lunch’s calories can come from fat, and less than 10 percent from saturated fat. No Trans Fat is allowed. Standards for sodium levels must also be met.

• Healthy cooking/preparation techniques that ensure the foods are baked, roasted, broiled, boiled or steamed - nothing is fried.

• Kids are offered healthy, tasty and appealing choices: o Whole grain breads and pastas o Fresh fruits and vegetables with every meal o Salad options daily at middle & high school o Pizza with whole grain crust, low-fat cheese o Low sugar breakfast cereals

Under the guidelines, students must be offered at least one serving of all five required food items for Lunch:

o Meat/Meat Alternate o Grains/Breads o Vegetables o Fruit o Milk

DATA CHART 11

In October 2012, 4,108 students qualified for Free & Reduced Lunch status and 6,889 students qualified for Full Pay Status. (A family of four are eligible for free & reduced lunch status if they earn $41,348 or less)

Over the previous five years, the Free & Reduced percentages have been steadily increasing. This year, it remained the same as last year at 37.5%.

Of those students eating lunch every day, a greater percentage are students who qualifying for Free & Reduced lunch.

Free & Reduced

37.5%

Full Pay62.5%

2012 Free & Reduced %

0%

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

30.6 31.8 34.4 36.5 37.5 37.5

69.4 68.2 65.6 63.5 62.5 62.5

Full Pay Free & Reduced

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

1936 2053 1894 1703 1602

2474 2666 2852 3044 3055

Free & Reduced Full Pay

Farm to School

For the second year in a row, with the assistance of the district’s Farm-to-School Advisory Committee, the Food Services Department offers a “Harvest of the Month” lunch. The aim of the program is to source fresh, local ingredients from local suppliers and to educate the students of the nutritional value of eating local food. Lunch participation on these days increases on average by 4.3%!

DATA CHART 12