Questions and Information

I’ve learned a few things and thought I would pass along the information. School board meetings are always open to the public and as part of this, the district staff are required to follow Open Meeting Laws. All meetings are to be posted ahead of time, with the exception of emergency meetings. The work session school board meetings do not have a public forum, but anyone can come and listen. The regular school board meetings do offer a public forum in Owatonna, but school boards are not required to offer the public forum. The school board committee meetings are also open to the public (committees are for policy, facilities, and finance). The notice for public meeting dates and times is posted on the district website, the district calendar, and on the school board meeting website. Meetings are also posted in the People’s Press.

The district has committees also, one of which is the District Curriculum Advisory Committee (https://www.isd761.org/district-services/teaching-learning/dcac). The district committees are not open to the public; however, they do include community members by application. Michelle Krell, the assistant superintendent, is leading this committee. She can be reached at MKRELL@isd761.org. One role of the school board is to approve curriculum; therefore, this committee should be advisory in nature only. I am not sure yet how curriculum is chosen and presented to the school board for approval.

The following are questions I recently emailed to our superintendent Jeff Elstad and our school board Chair Mark Sebring. I will be meeting with Mr. Sebring on 2/13/2023 and Mr. Elstad on 2/27/2023 to discuss:

1. Curriculum review: where do we find the curriculum information for our schools?  As I become familiar with MN Statutes, the school board is responsible for choosing curriculum…

2. How do we know what books are in our school libraries?  Who is in charge of this?  Who approves books that may be controversial?

3. Staff education: As there are a variety of topics and sessions when I attend a medical education conference, I’m wondering what types of training our educators and staff are doing on their work days.  Is this information posted anywhere? 

4. With all the talk (and confusion) regarding SEL and DEI these days, I’d like to find information about Owatonna’s social emotional learning plans/goals and our plans/goals for diversity, equity, and inclusion. 

In addition to the above information, I was notified by a parent that the middle school offers an elective class called LGBTQ+ and Friends.  This is offered to middle school students as part of the SOAR program. The concerns regarding this are that the parents did not know this was an elective option, they were not aware that their child chose this class until after it was chosen, there was no information about the discussions that were planned for the students or if there were any books or curriculum used/recommended. The other concern I have is regarding why this type of class is offered in public school, especially without parents’ permission. I will plan to discuss this in the meetings I noted above with Mr. Sebring and Mr. Elstad.

Next school board meeting is a work session at the District Office on February 13, 2023!