[Bret Champion Ed.D, LISD Asst. Superintendent, upon his announcement today as Superintendent finalist after a national search]

Bret,

I can't deny the stubborn dismay that initially clouds nights like tonight. I guess that's what happens when you see a chance to land on the moon, only to return to earth once again in a status quo cocoon.

A higher thought finally dawns... Did I mention Congratulations? Did I mention the board may accidentally be right, regardless of their arrogance and deceit, and you have the chance to prove it?

Pick a Superintendent "hero" to become. No more past, just future. Will you get the 10th fast growing district nationally to the next level? That's what matters.

~Pete Isburgh

Now that the bond has passed, what next?

What can the bond PAC do now to follow through after the gathering phase, to make certain our bond money is spent as wisely as it was planned?

What can the district do to continue improving, providing a place the right kind of Superintendent will want to call home?

Simple. Start with transparency. Transparency defuses anger and suspicion, letting in the fresh winds of credibility. Transparency brings good, intelligent, caring people into the kitchen where they can help. Given the data and opportunity to describe the future, true transparency would beget a renaissance.

What is transparency? First, it's an underlying proactive philosophy that exposes as much public data as possible without being asked. It's a fundamental shift in attitude away from the defensive "we know best" to "we need your help". We all make mistakes. Transparency makes mistakes easier to get over. True transparency gives stewardship back to the public. We all become stewards of the mission.

Transparency means starting small repositories of core financial, construction, and performance data in a way that people can manipulate and make sense of it. For example, it means an open zoning process where all documents are shared on a web site, not an ftp site. It means giving seminars on the financials of the district. It means posting a complete register in spreadsheet format month after month and leaving it online for historical use.

1. Seek to give the most context data possible to the committee, such as all demographer (PASA) documents (not a subset). Full 2006 Report Here (129MB) ... Full 2007 Report Here (49MB)

2. Establish better two-way communication between board and committee. The notion that the committee must complete its mission without further input from the board was a show stopper.

3. Enumerate the list of important principles and assumptions that *can* and (very importantly) *cannot* be considered in making a recommendation, much like a judge tells a jury. For example, if the district and board decide (as they did) that mobility is not a factor, that needs to be opened for public comment beforehand to reach agreement on the ground rules.

4. Methodology of making NBCD's should be documented for public comment and made into policy. Does a more useful way of establishing votes exist, such as by "logical neighborhood"? Should Steiner have (9) votes as it does now, for instance, when it may be just one "logical neighborhood"?

5. High density dwelling representation on the committee should be improved.

6. The scenario generation tool should integrate all known data elements, such as apartment dwellers, walkers, transfers, last moved, building capacity, free/reduced lunch, etc. Having to refer to multiple spreadsheets for this data should not be necessary (poor human engineering).