By Kim Hilsenbeck
An academic program management audit is complete, and Hays CISD is now looking to make changes.
Gibson Consulting Group shared the results of its academic program management audit with board members earlier this summer. Now the district and school board will make decisions on ways to implement the recommendations.
Superintendent Mike McKie said that budget-driven changes will be determined by the board while internal processes and management issues will be handled by administration, adding that the findings are mostly management driven.
For any changes not directed by trustees, he said, “We will report our progress to the board, of course.”
McKie, who came to Hays CISD in May 2013, said there was nothing too surprising and he recognized some of the issues when he took the reins.
“There were some details that were surprises because I didn’t know our system well enough at the time,” he said.
“Positive surprises, yes,” he said. “We need academic coordinators, we need additional support staff. I was pleasantly surprised.”
He said auditing a school district should be done with a positive goal in mind.
“When you conduct an audit like this, it’s not a ‘gotcha,’” McKie said. “It’s a matter of recognizing what you’re doing well and where you can improve; the mission with all audits is to identify areas where we can get better.”
Hays CISD’s last audit of this nature was conducted in 1995, according to Assistant Superintendent Kim Poole.
The audit focused on management processes, school level practices, automated tools and the accountability mechanisms used to support the academic program. The report authors said the audit was not an academic program evaluation.
Gibson’s audit involved analyzing data from teacher surveys, staff interviews, principal and teacher focus groups, classroom observations and district-provided data.
One change that McKie said came as a result of the audit is for Hays CISD to hire content coordinators.
Four content coordinators are coming on board this school year, McKie said. Gibson recommended hiring six.
“We’re thinking big and starting small,” he said.
Another issue Gibson identified was a fragmented system of decision making, particularly for professional development (PD).
“A big thing for me going through the report relates back to us having decentralized decision making,” McKie said. “For many years, we had a system whereby a principal could make certain decisions. Campuses were providing professional development when central office should have been doing that and providing the funding for it.”
One change that will result from the audit, McKie said, will be a centralized PD program funded by the district.
“We want a school system not a system of schools,” he added.
McKie also referred to decentralization among campuses in terms of technology. Some principals were directing the purchase of software and other technology, McKie said, but without one unifying voice of the district’s goals.
“Technology stuck out [in the report],” he said. “Campuses were purchasing technology (hardware and software) without having guidelines and regulations in place from the IT dept.”
How did Hays CISD become fragmented in its management with respect to areas such as professional development and technology?
Poole said part of the problem was philosophical issues at the administrative level.
“[The issue was] philosophies on how tightly you couple those [PD and IT] decisions and some of those decisions were loosely made to couple some of those issues,” she said.
Hays CISD spokesperson Tim Savoy said the district’s fast growth rate in the past decade was also an issue.
“Campuses were responding to needs as fast as they could,” he said.
While the fast growth of Hays CISD was a factor, McKie acknowledged that another factor was the high turnover rate of superintendents.
“Changing [superintendents] every two or three years is never a good situation,” he said. “That’s one of the negative sides of philosophies changing every few years.”
Another of the six recommendations is to reorganize the Division of Curriculum and Instruction, led by Poole, who had 14 direct reports.
“Hays CISD Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction has 14 direct reports, which is a higher span of control than similar sized school systems. Higher spans of control often limit effective oversight by one position,” the report stated.
The Gibson audit report concluded, “Instituting a more vertically differentiated organizational structure, meaning more levels of authority and oversight, will distribute authority between levels and give the division more control over its activities.”
Through classroom observations, Gibson also found inconsistent implementation of curriculum to meet the state standards. Some Hays CISD teachers had lesson plans written out, some made notations in a calendar and others had no lesson plans.
“Our implementation issue came as no surprise,” Poole said. “We had spotty implementation of our curriculum. Lesson planning was left entirely to each campus; we don’t have a district format.”
She said she is already working with principals on the issue.
Audit online
