School Briefs | School Board improves public access to meeting materials
Published 4:18 pm Tuesday, December 2, 2014
School Board improves public access to meeting materials
The Mercer Island School Board is enhancing public access to meeting materials online using BoardDocs. The web tool allows improved electronic access to Mercer Island School District (MISD) policies and meeting notices, agendas and meeting documents along with an improved search function.
“This new online system will allow our staff to prepare School Board meeting documents more efficiently, while enhancing the public’s ability to access and search School Board meeting materials,” said MISD Superintendent Dr. Gary Plano. “Since 2008 we have used the MISD website to share information with the public.”
The new system will also make searching past meeting materials easier. MISD Director of Information Technology Andreeves Ronser said, “One of the great benefits that BoardDocs provides is a stronger search tool, which will allow members of the community to more easily access the content they are looking for.”
Meeting documents will be posted and available on both the MISD website and on BoardDocs through the end of the calendar year, but upcoming board meeting documents will be available exclusively through BoardDocs beginning in January. Meeting materials since 2008 that are currently on the MISD website will also be transferred to BoardDocs in the coming months. The MISD plans to keep board materials on its website under School Board until all archived documents have been uploaded into BoardDocs. This migration is estimated to take several months.
To access MISD materials on BoardDocs, visit www.boarddocs.com/wa/misd/Board.nsf/Public.
Schools release 2013-14 annual report online
The Mercer Island School District (MISD) made its 16-page annual report for the 2013-14 school year available online, while the state-mandated print edition of the report will be delivered to all Mercer Island residents around the Thanksgiving holiday.
Superintendent Dr. Gary Plano wrote, “The 2013-14 school year was a year of building toward the future, both in the classroom and in our community.”
According to Dr. Plano, MISD achieved several important milestones during the year, including monitoring two of the six fundamentals of the Mercer Island School Board’s Vision 2020 against evidence, both quantitative and qualitative, for the first time, and launching the Diversity Advisory Committee to advise the superintendent on matters of diversity and equity.
The report includes stories of student learning like preparing elementary students for a digital economy through an introduction to coding, how Islander Middle School students are increasing personalized learning through independent science projects, and how Mercer Island High School students are working to put an end to bullying. Data in the report includes finances, enrollment, demographics, testing results, graduation rate and matriculation to institutions of higher education.
Key facts from the report:
• 4,318 student were enrolled as of June 1, 2014.
• MISD had a 95.4 percent graduation rate for the year.
• MISD spent $10,337 per student – $6,112 came from the state.
• Mercer Island Schools Foundation, PTAs and boosters contributions totaled nearly $1.9 million.
