EDUCATION OVERSIGHT BOARD MEETING MINUTES May 19, 2004 - 8:00 A.M. Room 412A State Capitol Building Oklahoma City, OK 73105 BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT: Don McCorkell, Gerald Dickerson, Ron Dryden, Susan Field, Patrick Gilmore, Sen. Penny Williams BOARD MEMBERS ABSENT: Kenneth Bridges, Rep. Barbara Staggs OTHER REGULAR ATTENDEES: Office of Accountability Staff: Robert Buswell, Matt Hesser, Jerry Hsieh, Leonard Hall VISITORS: None Call to Order and Roll Call: Mr. McCorkell called the meeting to order at 8:15 a.m. and declared a quorum present. Mr. McCorkell also took the opportunity to recommend that the Board approve that proclamations be presented to both Pete Churchwell and Ed Long for their years of service to the Education Oversight Board. The motion passed unanimously. Approval of Minutes: Minutes of the February 18, 2004 meeting were unanimously approved as submitted. Mr. Gilmore abstained from voting in that he had not attended the February meeting. Year to Date Expenditures Report for FY-04: Mr. Buswell reported that the Indicators Program would be closing out FY-04 dangerously tight on funds. Buswell advised the Board that the Office of Accountability had pared down operations greatly during FY-04 in an effort to conserve funds. Eliminating the printing of the Indicators Reports was one of the few areas left in which additional money could be saved. Buswell asked that the Office of Accountability be allowed to go back and charge all staff time (not just Dr. Hall's time) which had been utilized by OSPR against the OSPR budget. Mr. Dryden made a motion to grant the Office this latitude, Mr. Dickerson seconded the motion and it passed unanimously. Buswell moved onto the OSPR budget for FY-04. He anticipated $150,000 in carryover after accounting for the estimated costs associated with finalizing the Ponca City, Hennessey and Frontier reviews. Buswell reminded the Board, however, that the majority of the carryover amount was already committed on pending reviews. He also warned the Board that it appeared as though the legislature would be appropriating no new money to the program for FY-05. Mr. Dickerson commended the staff for their fine work. Mr. McCorkell then asked staff to excuse themselves while the Board discussed matters related to personnel. Status Report on the Oklahoma Educational Indicators Program: Senator Williams pointed out that there had been discussion at the February meeting of abandoning the 70% Performance Benchmark. The Senator advised against doing so in that the Benchmark was one of the few consistent measures of school performance. It was the general opinion of the Board that the Benchmark served its purpose well in facilitating conversation at the local school level and that it should be continued. Mr. Buswell reported that the School Report Cards had been sent out to schools for distribution to parents. The District Report was being printed, as was the State Report. Mr. Dryden reminded the Board that the Indicators Reports were no longer being distributed to libraries across the state. Buswell said that in previous years the library department had paid the postage for distribution to libraries but because of budget constraints this would no longer be the case. Dryden recommended that a flyer be produced and distributed to libraries advertising the existence of the reports online. Mr. Hesser then shared highlights from the State Report with the Board. The Board asked the Office to expand Figure 21 on page 37 of the State Report to include all expenditure areas covered in the ALL FUNDS methodology used in the Indicators Report Series. Mr. Dickerson then complemented staff for their work on the Indicators reports and the Board agreed. Status Report on the Oklahoma School Performance Review Program (OSPR): Dr. Hall said that the Billings report had been completed. The Superintendent of Billings had been using the report on a daily basis. The Ponca City review had also been released. Hall was impressed by the community interest and involvement that he witnessed with the Ponca City review. He reported that Ponca City Public Schools had already completed many of the recommendations, had made assignments to personnel to complete more of the recommendations, had some they were holding for the new superintendent to analyze and assign to personnel to complete and some they were not going to consider for now or not at all. The Ponca City Superintendent reports that the review accomplished what he wanted it to and the district was pleased with the results. Hall also reported that Stillwater Public School Board requested a school performance review to be started in the fall. The district will be responsible for 25% of the cost of this review. The RFP and timeline for Stillwater are basically completed and will be sent out to consultants later this summer. Report on Legislation: None New Business: None Announcements: None Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 10:40 a.m. The minutes of the May 19, 2004 Meeting of the Education Oversight Board were approved with corrections on June 23, 2004