Question #11 – Does Your Board Take a Strategic Approach to Meetings?

Rick Maloney

(49 Questions to Ask Your Board)

The school board meeting is the community’s window to the school system. The public often will assume schools are run the same way school board meetings are run. ― Gemberling et al1

This caution from the Key Work of School Boards reminds us of the importance of treating board meetings seriously. Like policy, meetings have the potential to be truly strategic or merely operational.

The board meeting minutes from a $60 million district showed it consuming precious time debating whether staff could spend $20 thousand for a copier/duplicator. The motion passed by a full show of hands and was followed by a similar vote to amend the budget. Was the school board acting irresponsibly in bothering with this means issue? The answer is a qualified “Yes.” Without a functionable model to help it separate its job from that of staff, it was doing what seemed the responsible thing to do. ― Gene Royer2

We must realize school boards are part-time bodies, so our time is precious. No matter how long the board’s meetings last or how many meetings are held, total meeting time is short and infrequent in comparison with time available for full-time staff to do their work.

The greatest enemy of strategic thinking and the powerful policy making role of boards is the linear, incremental-based board agenda. Trustees must control their agenda and not let their agenda control them. ― Davis Campbell and Michael Fullan3

When board meetings focus on members’ interest in the details of staff activity or other adult interests on a wide variety of issues, the board can easily become engaged in operational matters. Doing the work of staff is foolish. Who will do the work of the board?

Scenario: The board knew it was spending too much time on trivial issues, causing meetings to go longer and longer without noticeable benefit. Nobody liked what was happening. After several attempts, they initiated a practice of starting each meeting with a serious discussion about prioritizing items on the agenda. What was once a very perfunctory activity of simply approving the agenda now required a detailed discussion about what will be covered, how long it should take, and its relative worth or priority. Routine business items that previously had been discussed at length and eventually approved were moved to a consent agenda format where all items are voted on in one piece. Other business items (those not on the consent agenda) were prioritized and given an estimated time allotment. It became a practice to hold questions until the end of any formal presentation, clarifying questions being all the chair would allow. Meetings that had previously taken 3 and 4 hours were cut in half. Everyone saw that the new system worked well, and they were spending time on items the board considered strategically important.

A strategic approach to meetings recognizes that because there is limited time available boards should give special attention to agenda planning and ensure that the board is spending its limited time on true board business, work that focuses on student outcomes.

The urge to know what is going on (regardless of its importance) and to influence staff business must be countered by acknowledging that no one but the board can do the board’s job, so self-discipline is required to stay in the strategic realm of board business. Steering the board back on track and staying on track is an important skill to develop. It is essential that boards make the most of their meeting time, doing the board’s business and performing a strategic rather than merely operational function.

If your meetings are focused on trivia, that’s what the community will think of your work. That message also gets to staff. You can’t expect the community to believe that you are focused on student achievement if your meetings are about something else. ― Gary Brochu4

Let’s take a look at how boards spend their time.

Analyzing board meeting videos, A.J. Crabill of the Council of Great City Schools compares the amount of time devoted to student outcomes with time devoted to adult inputs such as program decisions and other administrative matters. Typically finding little to no time devoted to the former, he coaches boards to intentionally plan an agenda intensively focused on student outcomes and what the district is doing to produce them, displacing time devoted to matters that may be interesting to adults but of little importance to student outcomes. Under such coaching one board moved from 0% to 60% of board meeting time focused on student outcomes, and this change was followed by positive results.5

Research conducted by professors David Lee and Daniel Eadens reinforces the value of a strategic approach to meetings. Observing recorded board meetings and answering the question “On a scale of 1-5, how much time was spent on student achievement?” they found statistically significant differences, with boards in high-performing districts spending much more meeting time focused on student achievement.6

Setting policy for how meetings are run is an example of both a strategic use of policy and a strategic approach to meetings and can help board members prevent attempts to shift the board’s attention away from student achievement. Former Pennsylvania Executive Director Tom Gentzel offered this:

Board policy about meetings is also important… How is the agenda constructed? What is required to change it? Board meetings are not “unfettered democracies”: while boards have to be careful not to stifle the views of the minority, an individual does not have the right to dominate the meeting…when you have those renegade board members, there is a way to corral that. If someone just comes in and pushes their weight around, others can say, that’s not the way we do it.” ― Tom Gentzel4

The effective board takes charge of its meetings, knowing that meeting time is a limited resource. It uses board meetings strategically, carefully planning the agenda to distinguish the work of the board from that of staff. It adopts and consistently follows a protocol for board meetings, with clear expectations for its own conduct. It establishes practices and routines to guide its work. It recognizes when it is not operating on a strategic level, and takes intentional action to resolve the problem, steering itself back on track by reminding members of the protocol they have agreed to follow.

NOTE: The opinions expressed in these blog entries are informed by references cited herein, the experiences of the author, and those of his colleagues. Your comments are welcome additions to the conversation.

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Next: Question #12 – Does Your Board Serve as a Strategic Voice for Your Community?

One thought on “Question #11 – Does Your Board Take a Strategic Approach to Meetings?”

  1. Most Boards are not interested in student outcomes or adult professional practices in my experience. Mostly they front load with hours of trivia so they can pass their sweetheart contracts at 2 am when no one is in attendance! Always self over service and loyalty over competence! Read The Fog of Education!

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