Where are the children?: School board sets aside $350,000 to find out

MAT-SU -- How many Mat-Su high school students are dropping out or moving to other schools? This turned into a $350,000 question at last week's school board meeting.

Mat-Su Borough School Board member Bob Johnson requested a report last month on where and how the district is losing high school students. When Superintendent Pat Chesbro shared her report with board members last Wednesday, she pointed out more questions than answers and consequently won narrow board approval for a $350,000 improved data system.

"I think you've presented the case -- the need, very well … without that information it's a wonder that we're able to do that much," board member Mike Chmielewski said before voting along with Johnson, Rob Wells and board president Dan Contini in favor of spending as much as $350,000 on upgrading the district's system for managing student information.

The money for the data system came from more than $900,000 in additional funds from the state for the district's larger-than-anticipated enrollment this year.

Board members Carl Gatto, Linda Menard and Larry DeVilbiss voted against the motion, however, saying they were uncomfortable with the amount of money and the lack of details as to how it would be spent.

In support of her request for the funding, Chesbro displayed charts that show a steady growth at local elementary schools when a group of students is followed from one grade to the next. At the high school level, however, the numbers plunge dramatically. For example, in 2000, the number of 12th-graders enrolled in Mat-Su schools dropped to 65 percent of the number enrolled when that same class was in ninth grade four years earlier.

That was all the superintendent could report, however. She couldn't say how many of the same students had remained since their freshman year, how many had transferred to other schools or correspondence programs in the district or state, or how many had dropped out altogether.

"These are just the gross number of students who were enrolled," Chesbro explained. "We don't know which students, we don't know why …"

The district's current data system does not track individual students. Therefore, dozens of students could be leaving a school and an equal number coming in and the final number would show no loss or growth.

At the same time, the system does not allow teachers or administrators to follow transfers within the district to other high schools or other programs.

Johnson said this is one of the reasons he was interested to know the numbers -- if one program is attracting students from within the district, he would like to know what that school is doing right, so it could be repeated at those schools that are losing students.

"We really need easy access to the information to help make decisions," Chesbro said.

The superintendent pointed out that it had taken one employee two full days to gather the limited data she presented at the meeting.

"In this data-driven age, it is very important for people to be able to spend time analyzing data rather than just getting it out of wherever it is stored," she said.

Chmielewski agreed, saying the Anchorage School District can easily retrieve data on everything from the number of male vs. female students in various schools to what courses they are taking. This type of information, he said, allows administrators and teachers to better evaluate the success of their own programs.

Wells made the argument that such information is increasingly in demand at the state and national level as lawmakers and others look for hard figures to back up funding decisions.

"Even though this is a large sum of money, I think it's really important that we take this step," Wells said.

While those board members who voted against the motion said they agreed that such data would be useful, they said it was too much money to spend without more details.

"You've done a good job of selling it, but we have an imaginary number out there," DeVilbiss said.

In the board packet, the budget revision was described only as a "student management system." DeVilbiss said he wanted more specifics as to what kind of software programs would be purchased and what additional funds might be needed to install it and train people to use it.

Chesbro said it isn't clear yet exactly how the money will be spent but that the board's approval was necessary to even begin the request-for-proposals process. She said it might be possible for the district to upgrade its current system to perform these functions, which would mean substantially less cost. Either way, she said, the district would not spend more than the board had agreed to.

In the end, the board removed the $350,000 item from a long list of other budget items paid for by the additional state money.

The board unanimously approved the other items, which included more than $600,000 in furniture and custodial equipment for older schools, special education, vocational and warehouse equipment, energy conservation improvements at schools, snow-removal tractors and a $65,000 sweeper-vacuum truck to remove winter sand from school parking lots after the snow has melted. The board then approved the data system in a 4-to-3 vote.

"The difference between this and the vacuum sweeper," DeVilbiss said of his split vote, " is that it said vacuum sweeper."