Parents meet with SPS superintendent to talk student behavior, technology use changes

An hour into a Monday evening meeting with parents, Superintendent Grenita Lathan grew impatient. She started pacing.

Lathan admitted waiting was the hardest part. She was eager to get to the second half of the 2 1/2-hour meeting where parents offered insight, asked questions and made suggestions.

To kick off the meeting, Lathan asked parents to tell her what the district should start doing, stop doing or change in four key areas: Student behavior, parent and teacher engagement, technology integration, and what was taught and how.

They did not appear to hold back, offering their opinions and letting Lathan know when they agreed with the other parents or not.

"You are here because we want to hear from you all," she said, as part of the welcome. "We know we have areas of needed improvement."

Lathan told parents their feedback will be provided to principals and her leadership team and become part of the equation as changes are made.

She said the district is "constantly in problem-solving mode," even if that is not apparent to the public. She said the district always wants to get better and was eager for the input.

She asked the group to be transparent, factual and solutions-oriented. "The way we have a great community is that we work together. We don't tear it down."

The event was open to any district parent. Of the 34 who registered, 17 participated. Lathan said holding the meeting during the final week of classes was a risk but she wanted to get it scheduled before summer break.

Parents spent more than an hour writing individual responses, sharing their opinions in small groups, and recording the main points in each key area on large poster-size sheets of paper.

Talking about student behavior issues

In the second half of the meeting — the part Lathan was waiting for — the superintendent read through all the main points from parents, initiating a discussion by either responding or asking for more details.

Most of the time was devoted to one topic: Student behavior.

Parents told her to focus on putting out "small fires" when it came to behavior issues, asserting that will help avoid the bigger ones.

A lot of the parents agreed they wanted better communication from the district about behavior issues. One asked for regular updates about what is going on and how concerns are being addressed.

Multiple parents said information spreads quickly between students and staff at different schools and through social media.

They suggested the district inform parents across schools if there is a significant incident in one building — citing, for example, an assault at Hickory Hills Middle School and a cafeteria fight at Parkview High School, both in January.

Stephanie Sproule, a parent, said district statements can be "so vague it makes it more frightening and scary than it actually is."

She urged the district to be more direct and as detailed as possible while respecting student privacy.

Lathan said the district will "keep trying to work on that" but asked for patience when a situation is still developing or in the immediate aftermath. "We need to make sure the message is correct."

She said the priority is notifying the school families impacted first but she is open to sending a message to the entire district, when warranted.

"Let's say something happens at Hillcrest, we try and communicate with Hillcrest. Sometimes we do communicate with those elementary and middle schools around it but then we have a Kickapoo parent say 'I just heard about it, why didn't you communicate with Kickapoo?'" Lathan said.

"We try to keep the communication to that particular area but sometimes we find we do need to do districtwide communications. That is something we could work on."

To illustrate the perils of communicating "in real time," Lathan talked about how many messages she sent the school board April 3, after a registered sex offender forced his way on a school bus near Field Elementary carrying Pershing Middle School students.

Her duty was to keep the board informed. Meanwhile, the district first messaged Field and Pershing families before it responded to the media.

"I'm sending a message to our board members with 'here's what we know' and they know it's not going to be 100%. I have to send sometimes five or six messages saying 'OK, this is No. 2, here is what we now know, it's 13 students as opposed to 34 students," she said.

Justine Lashure, a parent, said she was frustrated the school sent a message to parents about a student dying "after they had told her students already."

Stephen Hall, chief communications officer, said the district works to coordinate messages but sometimes one gets ahead of the other.

"It is a dance that we have to do with the timeline," Hall said. "What we try to do is send it out while we're telling the students so that the students are around the trained counselors at school."

Marlin Barber, a parent who works at Missouri State University, asked if the district developed contingency plans for different scenarios.

"Maybe communicating those steps, those protocols and those processes to parents as well as students, just letting them know that if something like this happens, we have a plan in place. Here is what the plan is," he said.

The conversation turned to student discipline. Nicole Holt, deputy superintendent of academics, told parents that in a similar meeting with teachers, they were asking the district to spell out what steps are taken after they make a referral after an infraction.

"I could see us doing something specific for parents, asking our leaders to communicate should your student have a behavior or a discipline issue on campus that requires formal consequences, here is what you can expect. They will be issued this, we'll contact you," Holt said. "... If we said proactively 'Here is what you can expect' so when that first time happens, it is not that surprising."

The district plans additional training this summer for teachers and administrators in an effort to make sure there is a consistent approach to discipline.

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"They'll have training around what is considered a Level One, a classroom situation that needs to be addressed, what is considered a true office referral. That is the disconnect in our district right now," she said.

Lathan said there is a concern that the two primary student behavior programs in the district, Conscious Discipline and Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports, or PBIS, are in conflict or are inconsistent, which the district will work through this year.

Citing "different opinions" about focus rooms, a designated place where an upset or unruly student can go to get back on track, Lathan said the district is working to clarify how such spaces are used.

Technology plan, school boundaries discussed

The initial two hours allotted for the meeting elapsed before the discussion turned to the three other areas where input was sought.

Most of the group opted to stay to discuss parent and teacher engagement, technology integration, and what was taught and how.

Parents complained about how many notifications they get, from low lunch account balances to an overdue library book, that do not mention the name of the student or the school. That was confusing for parents with students in different buildings.

They told Lathan that while they appreciate the communication, they start to tune out if there are too many phone calls, alerts or emails.

Several parents said they were not aware that SPS had a smartphone app available to download.

In response to a suggestion about teaching internet ethics or digital citizenship at an early age, Lathan said that is already in place.

"We have a curriculum tied to that. You are going to hear more about that in our technology plan around internet usage and all that," Lathan said. "It actually start at elementary level and goes all the way up."

Slowing the use of Chromebooks was suggested. "I think we've got a little bit better," Lathan responded, noting the devices do not go home in the earlier grades and other limitations have been put in place.

Sproule, a parent, said the level of reliance on Chromebooks in middle school still needs to improve. She also spoke about needs in other areas.

"Parents want to do more supporting but there is just a huge transparency and communication gap," she said. "Once we see that close a little more, I think we'll see a huge improvement on every single end."

Lathan said a technology plan to be unveiled this summer will work to simplify the way the district communicates with parents, likely requiring teachers to use the same messaging platform.

"We've heard that multiple years, we need to streamline," she said. "... Some people are not going to be happy about that but you can't have all these different methods ... and you don't know what to check."

Parents asked for a district cell phone policy that sets expectations based on the age of students. They also noted a need for the district to provide support for parents on how to navigate Canvas or Home Access, where they can get information about grades, assignments and more.

Lathan fielded questions about the gifted program, including if the pullout program was still the best option, and if there was a way to address the fundraising inequity between school PTAs.

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Responding to a question about feeder patterns, Lathan said a discussion about school boundaries is scheduled for this fall.

She also told parents it is the goal of the district to start providing busing to any elementary student who lives one mile or more from their school starting in August 2025. Currently, eligibility starts at 1.5 miles.

"In order to be able to do that, we want to look at several things. We want to look at (school) boundaries and try to provide more transportation to elementary students that are one mile ... that is our goal," Lathan said. "It means two or three schools might have to shift to a different start time."

What is Superintendent Solutions?

The meeting is a format Superintendent Grenita Lathan has been using to gather feedback from a specific group of stakeholders — educators, community members or parents — on a list of key topics, typically four.

Those who volunteer are asked to go through a process to help identify what the district should stop doing, start doing, or slow down and adjust in each area.

Lathan said she takes the feedback and runs it by internal groups, including the principals and her leadership team, to determine next steps. Sometimes, she asks for a follow-up meeting with the stakeholders to seek clarification or to report the results.

Parents who participated Monday include: Lexi Amos, Sarah Jean Baker, Marlin Barber, Brettany Bohannon, Renee Brumett, Susan Curtis, Kyle Hampton, Dany Lacio, Tara Lacio, Justine Lashure, Misty McIntosh, Amanda Shouse, Stephanie Sproule, Kai Sutton, Christine Thompson, Jennifer Wellborn, and Josh Wellborn.

Lathan said she hopes to meet with the same group again later this year.

Other outreach by the district includes the evening SPS University events held during the school year for families. It typically includes updates or announcements, breakout sessions on topics of interest to the public, and an on-site resource fair.

Lathan also started "Let's Talk," a time for community members to ask her questions on any district-related topic in person.

Details on how to participate in the events are posted in advance on sps.org.

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Springfield parents give superintendent feedback on these 4 key areas