Skip to main content

Natick's Beloved Audit

The Natick Public Schools recently received the final report from the Beloved Audit- a resource made available to us in 2020 because of our participation in the METCO Program (THANK YOU METCO and ALL of the administrators who helped complete the audit!).  It was developed and run by The Beloved Community.  

Descriptions from the Report:

What is it?  

The Equity Audit is designed to provide comprehensive feedback on Natick Public Schools’ capacity for diversity, equity, and inclusion with all stakeholder groups.

How was it developed:  

A group of key leaders at Natick Public Schools spent hours completing this self-study and identifying relevant data sets for each area. The Equity Audit is designed with 14 sub-standards and 180+ indicators about nearly every facet of organizational work life.

Some concrete suggestions that I read in the report:

/Diversity - Ask questions like who is participating and why?
/Inclusion - Some are better than others, now is the time to make efforts for consistency across the district
/Equity - Build onramps for equity for new leaders and institutionalize disaggregated data analysis across the organization.

Different Stakeholders:
/The School Committee has established inclusive and equitable practices but without data the impact cannot be assessed.
/Establishing constructive feedback loops for faculty and staff will help culture around DEI.
/Family data and feedback could be improved.
/Student facing policies are a good start, improve data collection to see impact on strategic goals

The lowest scores we received were in:

Belonging (27%), Institutional Advancement (31%) and Parents/Guardians as Stakeholders (32%) 

The highest scores were in: 

Equitable Advancement within NPS (69%), Financial (equitable wages) (61%) and Students (strategies identified to achieve a diverse student body) (59%) 

Both the report and our administration acknowledge this audit as one step in Natick's journey of diversity, equity and inclusion and hope that it helps guides our next steps. I wonder if, included in those next steps, we should pursue a report that is not only completed by an external organization but also that includes a wider set of stakeholders within our community in the reporting and reflection.

School Committee discussion on the Beloved Audit Report: Natick Pegaus link - see minutes 52:30 - 57:00 

Full Discussion on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion 

May 10th School Committee:  Natick Pegaus link  

A few comments about DEI that stood out to me during the meeting:  

  • One of the major goals at the High School this year has been through a prompt asked in in the Principal Advisory Group: Do students feel that they have to check a portion of their identity at the door?  We're asking this because inclusion doesn't have to mean assimilating. 

  • The Beloved Audit helped us see that while we do some data tracking, we could do more.

  • "Nothing for us without us" - an approach to work that is grounded in empowerment within the community the work is seeking to serve. 

  • Comparisons can help normalize information but it is important that Natick pursues its own journey. We are a unique community with unique needs and desires. 

  • Promoting an inclusion culture is about creating a sense of belonging for all of our students and that conversation can be had from calculus to kindergarten. 
     
  • We have to be the type of district where diverse candidates want to come.

  • We need to resurrect the Natick Public Schools Diversity Committee with stakeholders that represent the diversity in our town and includes our Boston students.  

DEI Area Goals School Committee Presentation

Popular posts from this blog

Statement on Recusal

Here are the remarks I gave last night when letting my committee know my decision to recuse:  After the School Committee meeting on October 15th, several individuals wrote into the SpeakUp Natick portal requesting that I recuse myself from voting on the possible closure of Johnson.  The substance of these messages, sent to the full committee, carried a familiar refrain. The messages - often using the same language – said some version of the following:  Catherine Brunell should recuse herself from deliberating and voting on the closure of Johnson because she lacks objectivity, as her children go to school there and she is from that neighborhood. I asked myself the question if there was any merit to the request for me to recuse myself and started to do some research about why people recuse  From what I can tell from the minutes, in Natick, It’s never happened before - not with the Kennedy, Wilson or the High School - not even for members whose children were to attend the future rebuilt s
Read more

Questions that I am asking or have received...

Serving in this role, I hold a seat that gives me the ability to ask my questions and yours to our administration with the hope that the questions reinforce our strategic goals. I've long relied on the value that, "two heads are better than one."  So here are some of the questions that the School Committee has been asked this week by parents and constituents: Cameron Middle School in Framingham 1) Will outdoor structures be used in the fall to allow for outdoor mask breaks when the weather is poor or lunch in a safer setting?   While this falls into an operational issue at the school and is not typically in the purview of the School Committee, because of COVID we have an  interim COVID policy  (page 120) where it is stated that the school committee establishes an emergency, interim policy to promote public safety and safety of students and faculty.   Perhaps one example of the use of the application of this policy could be seen in the March 15th School Committee meeting  
Read more

In other news... (With correction about the Special Election)

 If you voted yesterday in the State primaries... you might have been surprised like me - I thought I would also be casting a vote for the Natick Select Board seat that sits open...  But, because of laws beyond anyone's control - Natick has to hold another election next week for an uncontested race on Tuesday September 13th.  Voting information here. I'm told that years ago Natick had to hold PRIMARIES because there were often so many people who wanted to run in the elections.  Sigh. I'm always grateful to anyone who will run and am happy to cast a vote next Tuesday - but I'd like to hope we have some contested races in March.  Correction: After publishing the blog, thanks to my readers, I learned that the above is incorrect:   The Select Board, by town charter,  can have a vacancy until the next election (March 2023), they may call for a special election themselves or be required to call for a special election if 200 people sign a petition calling for one.  The speci
Read more