Mageen Caines, school board member, is leading the facilitation of the equity review and has published a short article explaining how the equity review will look for students and staff. 

Hi St Anthony - New Brighton families. My name is Mageen Caines (she/her), and I'm a member of the SANB school board. I'm the lead for the equity review of the district and would like to give you updates as we progress in the process. 

The school board has directed the district to complete an equity review.  We requested proposals and reviewed them at the August 23 board meeting, if you’d like to see what we looked at.  We selected the Center for Educational Leadership, under their program “Building Your Equity Leadership Vision."

The survey will ask students and staff how equity work looks and feels in our schools. We are interested in all the selves that students and staff bring into school and are mindful and intentional of looking for patterns around gender, race, sexual orientation, socioeconomics, cultural heritage, and many other dynamics.  The questions we are asking are focused on the schools themselves, building by building, due to the different needs that students and staff have at each level.  As the principal is the leader of the school, questions are focused on principals and how they provide and experience support.

The program we are using has two phases, called Discovery and Planning.  Both parts will be accomplished by the end of the 2022-2023 school year.

The Discovery phase includes a district-wide survey and 21 focus groups to go deeper as we learn directly from students and staff, and some parents/adults in the community.  Additionally, there will be inquiry into school district data and artifacts, which means they will look at things the district has created, like vision statements or success metrics, and data we’ve collected in other ways and other times.

In addition to sharing with you about the process, I also want to share opportunities for you to participate.  Please tell us your experiences!

First opportunity: Everyone will be invited to take a survey.  Students in the middle school and high school and all adults in the school district will be offered a survey that mirrors the focus group questions.  Because we’re going to use the exact questions from the focus groups, this will be an open-ended survey.  Everyone can share their information, stories, and observations with the Center for Educational Leadership.

Second opportunity:  We will hold a series of focus groups to go deeper on areas that have been previously identified through community conversation, surveys, and other engagement. These groups are by invitation, designed to better understand the concerns that have been raised. Not everyone will be invited to these groups because we’re looking at some really specific perspectives. Everyone will have the same starting questions in the group or the survey, however.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out. I'm available by email at mcaines@isd282.org. We look forward to learning more about our district!