Community asked to help define schools' mission

If you could describe what the Burke County Public Schools will be in the future, using 30 words or less, what would you say?
A vanguard of about three-dozen people on Feb. 25 started what ultimately will be a countywide effort to define a strategic vision and mission statement for the schools.
Three school board members will report on the effort when the Burke County Board of Education has its regular monthly meeting at 6 p.m. today in the West Concord Resource Center, 509 W. Concord.
The strategic vision and mission project will expand into the community with five to seven public meetings where anyone can add input and suggestions. The first is scheduled for 4 to 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in Table Rock Middle School's media center.
The group who met last month at the Rutherford College Town Hall spent several hours coming up with possible vision and mission statements. Dr. Julia Mobley, a planning consultant and former schools superintendent, guided the process. Among those on hand were school administrators, teachers, elected leaders (including school board members Buddy Armour, Tim Buff and Sam Wilkinson) and people from businesses, churches and the media. Among them are parents with children in the schools.
"We're going to talk about how we're going to create the future," Mobley explained. "Everything you do in a school should be directed toward your goal or purpose."
A vision statement, she said, defines what the school system aspires to be.
"Without a clearly articulated, commonly perceived vision for an organization," Mobley explained, "it is unlikely that the people who work in that organization will be as purposeful and productive as they potentially should and could be."
The mission statement, she continued, is a clear, concise expression of the school system's purpose and function.
Both statements should be concise, easily remembered, often repeated, Mobley said. That's because they will guide decisions about how to make the schools achieve people's expectations.
"You never want to do less than your very best for your school system," Mobley said.
But what does "best" mean?
Utilizing a process that's probably familiar to many people in business and industry, Mobley divided the large group at the Rutherford College Town Hall into a handful of smaller ones, each with members from the various constituencies. Those small groups offered suggestions for elements of the vision and mission statements. Two drafting committees then assembled draft statements from what most people felt were essential elements.
The preliminary vision statement reads, "Burke County Public Schools, a world-class model of exemplary education, inspires students to be life-long learners who compete on the global stage while contributing to their community as exemplary citizens."
And the preliminary mission statement says, "The mission of Burke County Public Schools is to educate diverse learners, nurture their potential and empower them to be competitive, successful and productive citizens."
Community members will refine those preliminary statements by discussing them and by adding and subtracting elements and language. The goal is to finalize two statements by April 24 that can be proposed to the school board for adoption.
"Normally, most schools take a year for this process," Superintendent Dr. Art Stellar said. "We don't have that kind of time."
That's because the Burke County Board of Education is working against a May 1 deadline to show it is meeting the standards of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Council on Accreditation and School Improvement.
SACS CASI's No. 1 requirement is for the school board to "establish and implement a collaborative process to involve stakeholder groups in the development and understanding of a systemwide vision and purpose to guide the continuous-improvement process, allocation and alignment of resources and daily actions of the school community...."
SACS CASI in August put Burke County's four high schools on probationary accreditation because the school board wasn't meeting its standards for vision, governance, leadership and relations with the community.
The school board by March 12 must send SACS CASI a written report on its progress toward meeting those standards. The progress report also is on the board's agenda for tonight.
The complete agenda is at the school district's Web site, www.burke.k12.nc.us.