D65 Meet the Candidate: Maria Forres Opdycke

Post 10/11 in a 10 day series on District 65 Candidates for Office

This is a post in a series that will run from March 7 to March 17th where I’ve given District 65 Board Candidates the option to post whatever they want on the blog. I gave them no limitations, except to follow the standard comment section rules and I do no editing, beyond formatting.

If you have questions for the candidates, please also follow the rules on the comment section.

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Thank you Tom, for bringing the truth to light and providing a forum for people to dialogue about facts in service of the greater good of our community.

A Brief Introduction

I’m the mother of three children, a former Dewey PTA co-president, a District 65 volunteer, a healthcare executive, and an entrepreneur. I have lived in Evanston for 10 years. My husband and his family are lifelong Evanstonians, and they attended District 65 schools. Living in Evanston has given me a deep sense of community, of which District 65 is a critical part. Building an excellent school district that addresses the needs of all of Evanston’s children is at the heart of why I’m running for District 65 school board. You can read more about me here. My name will be last on the list of candidates when you head to the voting booth. (My last name is pronounced “Updike.”).

My skillset as a finance and operations executive is uniquely applicable to the current crisis at District 65. I will apply rigor and operational accountability that will lead us back to financial sustainability so that we can continue to focus on equitable educational excellence. Below are the two initiatives I would promote in the first several months should I be elected to the board. In order to ensure that our most marginalized students have the resources they need, the board must act swiftly to ensure our district is on sound financial footing.

Step 1: Create a set of financial and operational metrics that the board reviews on a monthly basis and the broader community has access to.

“We cannot improve what we don’t measure” as the saying goes. This goes beyond the list of bills paid or budget reconciliation. The metrics we monitor and how they are used is something the new board should discuss at length and communicate to the community. I’d also welcome 3rd party auditing of our metrics (Tom, please continue what you’re doing!). The reason we are in this financial crisis is because we were not tracking benchmark metrics of spending or holding leadership accountable. We must gauge these benchmarks against other similar districts as well.

I don’t have all of the answers and I plan to solicit ideas and feedback from the community, but listed below are ideas of where I might start.

Financial Metrics:

1. Instructional spending per student per school. We should not have to dig for data on this metric, and we must be transparent about how much of our budget is addressing student instruction. When you hear candidates say, “We want to limit the spending cuts to areas outside of the classroom,” this metric will tell you if we are actually doing that.

2. Non-instructional spending per student per school. This allows us to monitor the other costs of operating buildings that impact budgetary decisions.

3. Spending per ride for bus and private transport. Transportation costs have increased four-fold over the last four years. As we go forward discussing school consolidation, we want to forecast this number. For reference, today we spend about $42 per day for each student that rides the bus or is transported privately ($11.7 million annually). I believe we can significantly reduce this number.

4. Technology spending per student, including support costs. As we think about streamlining our resources, let’s monitor how much we are investing in technology, including the support costs. I’d like to better understand how much time teachers spend on tech support, broken iPads, and promote sound technology policies.

5. Reimbursable and non-reimbursable spending on special education per student per month. Special education spending has increased tremendously over the last several years. A lot of that spending is reimbursed by the federal government (at least for now), but not all of it. Serving students with disabilities and special needs is critical and difficult, and we should ensure this investment is in line with results.

6. Percentage of children achieving at grade level, by grade and by school. We see this number buried in school report cards and can sometimes be a year old. I’d like to ensure we are looking at this number regularly so that we can ensure that resources are getting to the right students at the right time. We will look at this metric by race, income, and how far we are from 100%.

7. Administrator to student ratio. This metric was wildly out of sync with state averages and would have served us well to monitor. Monitoring central office resource allocation will help us focus spending on students.

Operational metrics we should publish to understand the health of the staff and the communities’ belief that we are getting back on track.

1. Teacher attrition per school

2. Teacher attendance per school

3. Principal tenure per school

4. Student attrition per school (students who have left the district)

Step 2: Create a Framework for Holding the Superintendent Accountable

While the financial crisis is the most pressing issue the board needs to address, a lack of accountability is the actual problem we need to fix. From the Board to the Superintendent to school leadership, we have seen the costs of this dysfunction. We also need transparency into what the administration is working on, how it will impact the goals, and how that work is going. In answer to a common question I’ve seen here, in any future potential searches for a superintendent, I would advocate for an open process.

I will help the board build an evaluation framework by:

1. Collaborating with the Board to create a Superintendent evaluation framework

   1. Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) has a good starting framework. Each board member will be accountable for evaluating the Superintendent’s work and providing constructive feedback on how they are serving according to the strategic goals.

2. Collaborating with the Superintendent to create a board evaluation framework

   1. The Superintendent will evaluate how the board is supporting the administration, ensuring the Superintendent has the ability to give the board feedback on how it is managing and governing the Superintendent.

3. Creating a school administration and staff survey

   1. Ensure the school administration and staff have a survey twice per year to anonymously identify gaps in service so the staff feel they have a voice in how the administration is serving them.

4. Setting strategic goals rooted in student achievement that have corresponding key metrics to indicate how successfully the administration is accomplishing these goals.

5. Building an Initiative Reporting Structure. Provide a structure for the Superintendent to report on the key initiatives she and her team are working on, the metrics it will address and provide progress updates to the board. It is critical that we know what the administration is focused on and how they are executing against those priorities.

I would like the Board to function as a partner to the Superintendent and a bridge to the community. We have largely let the administration function without transparent checks and balances, to disastrous consequences. There are a lot of problems to solve, but we need to start with the building blocks of transparency and accountability.

This is a critical time in the history of D65 and your vote will ensure the necessary changes are made. I’m hopeful as I have met so many caring members of our community who are engaging in these critical conversations. I look forward to continuing the dialogue in the comments here or email me at maria@mariafor65.com