Early risers, watchful eyes and collegial collaboration
Vignettes from behind the scenes at CSBA
By:
Carol Brydolf
Published: March 17, 2011
Cindy Akin begins her workday at about 5 a.m.—two hours before she arrives at her West Sacramento office. Scrolling through her CSBA e-mail account in her Sierra foothills home as she sips her morning coffee, Akin gets a preview of what the day will hold.
“When I know what’s waiting for me at the office, I can begin planning what I need to do as I’m driving to work,” says Akin, a consultant in CSBA’s Policy Services Department who helps the decision makers at California’s more than 1,000 school districts and county offices of education revise and customize policies.
“What I do depends on what our members ask for,” says Akin, who comes to the job with a special perspective, having served two terms on the board of the Gold Trail Union School District in El Dorado County.
Akin—and all of CSBA’s employees—know there would be no California School Boards Association without school board members themselves and the invaluable work that school boards do. The civic-minded people who are willing to compete at the ballot box for the chance to help govern their local schools (and who, if they win, are “rewarded” with long hours of preparation for board meetings that may last even longer) are the peak of the pyramid, and they—or, more precisely, the children they serve—are the reason CSBA exists.
CSBA President Martha Fluor has graciously emphasized the need to include the staff in her goal to recognize the efforts that everyone connected with the association makes on behalf of public education. Relatively few of the association’s members have visited the modest offices where most of the work on their behalf takes place, and many members may not be familiar with all of the programs and services available, or with the experience and expertise that go into them.
Most California Schools features look outward, at what the industrious and innovative people at the local level do; this article is a rare look behind the scenes, an effort to illustrate just a bit of about what the staff does, why it matters, and how the association as a whole works together.
Doing more, with less
Some CSBA services and spokespeople are familiar. There’s the Education Legal Alliance and its director, Richard Hamilton, who makes headlines advocating for schools’ interests in high-profile cases concerning such bottom-line governance issues as unfunded mandates, long-overdue special education payments and charter school rules.
Assistant Executive Director for Governmental Relations Rick Pratt and his team testify at legislative hearings, issue briefings on state and federal education budgets and legislation, appear at press conferences and speak at workshops, webinars and events hosted by CSBA and other friends of public education.
But each of the association’s most visible representatives is to some extent supported by the efforts of others who labor behind the scenes, carrying on—just as our members do—in the face of fiscal challenges and other obstacles.
CSBA is a bit leaner than it was in the years when the state economy was booming. With a roster of 97 full-and part-time employees, there are 20 fewer workers now than in 2008. Like so many of its members, the association has learned to do more with fewer resources in recent years. Despite those staff reductions, CSBA offers more services to more clients than ever before. When Akin joined CSBA’s policy services staff in 2006, for example, there were 240 Manual Maintenance clients. Now there are 360—and three fewer employees in the department. The largest policy services program, GAMUT Online, grew from 570 to 793 subscribers over the same period.
Akin and the others who deliver CSBA’s policy services undertake essential work on behalf of their clients, whether it’s auditing a district policy manual or conducting a workshop about available services. The team provides the framework and “operating instructions” that guide governance teams’ management of everything from cyberbullying and student medication to employee leave provisions, school meal programs and beyond.
Policy services consultants audit and assist with updating the policy manuals of local educational agencies that subscribe to CSBA’s policy services, issuing revisions three times a year (and more often if an urgent issue requires immediate attention). They also review and edit customized policy manuals and partner with GAMUT Online, CSBA’s Web-based policy information subscription service that provides instant access to more than 800 sample policies and administrative regulations, the state’s Education Code and other state and federal laws and regulations.
A watchful eye
They’d be hard-pressed to do it without Judy Cias. CSBA’s acting general counsel is instrumental in the policy work and much else that the association does, all while keeping a watchful eye on CSBA contracts and other legal issues. She works closely with colleagues from many CSBA departments. About 20 percent of her job is reserved for policy work, for example, so she collaborates with Akin and other members of the policy team.
With the Governmental Relations Department, Cias tracks the 700-plus bills signed into California law each year and examines legal decisions and state and federal regulations to determine which have implications for schools and their policies. Last year she identified some 65 policies that needed revision due to changes in state law.
Cias also maintains a detailed list of issues that could impact district or county office policies. She stays in close touch with members, and she fields questions about everything from public comment at board meetings to how the latest political pronouncement from the state Capitol might impact LEA policies. She’s also the association’s resident expert on open meeting law; she wrote and continually updates the association’s handbook on the Ralph M. Brown Act.
“I get a lot of calls from members with questions about technical aspects of the Brown Act,” she says. “I hear, for example, from board members who want to know whether a visit by a majority of their board’s members to a school site is subject to open meeting laws that would require it to be placed on the board agenda.” (The answer, by the way, is yes—because board members touring a school would almost certainly discuss official business.)
CSBA: At the table, and at the podium  In addition to overseeing the arduous and important task of amending the association’s Policy Platform every two years, CSBA Research and Policy Analyst Marguerite Noteware (shown here at left, with Senior Policy Consultant Stephanie Medrano Farland) also tracks a number of key education issues, including youth in foster care, kindergarten and early childhood education, and implications of President Obama’s Race to the Top interventions. She writes policy briefs detailing potential impacts of the latest developments in these and other areas and regularly testifies before the State Board of Education. She also attends a number of state committee meetings to collect the latest policy and regulatory news and to ensure that school governance teams have a voice when critical decisions are being made. “My job is always changing because the state of education is always changing,” Noteware says. “CSBA is known as a good source of information about issues that are important to schools, so we’re asked to be at the table—both because of the personal and professional relationships we’ve developed and because of our demonstrated expertise.”
|
‘Trying to do the right things’ While Cias—and Akin and the rest of the policy services team, and other staffers—attend to written policies, contracts and laws, Christopher Maricle is among those who specialize in reading between the lines. As part of his work as a CSBA governance consultant, this former elementary principal and teacher travels the state to help school trustees identify what he calls the “unwritten agreements” that influence governing board behavior and relationships between members.
“A lot of boards that call us have not put into writing the agreements on how the board will operate,” says Maricle. “They often have implicit agreements. It gets difficult when new members join the board or there are other significant changes. Helping boards clarify how they are going to operate is one of the key services we provide.”
Maricle’s work has taken him to every county in the state and left him with enormous respect for the board members and administrators he’s met.
“We’ve got a lot of elected citizens trying to do the right things for schools and kids,” he says. “The hard thing is when you have five people who all want to do the right thing but who don’t agree what the right thing is.”
Helping to weather the storm
Clearly, CSBA must devote a great deal of its attention to rules and regulations and dollars and cents—especially in these times of unprecedented governmental oversight of school functions and record-breaking reductions in state funding for public education. Helping LEAs weather the devastating revenue cuts necessitated by California’s multibillion-dollar deficit has been one of the key focuses of CSBA’s District and Financial Services Department. There, staff members partner with outside vendors to provide services that help CSBA’s members address cash-flow shortages, fund retiree health-care benefit costs, streamline utility expenses and maximize Medi-Cal reimbursement for critical services to students.
When Ludvina Guzman joined CSBA in 2002, CSBA offered 12 financial services programs. Now there are 30.
Guzman calls her boss, Suzi Rader—now in her 34th year at CSBA—“a rock star” for her ability to keep track of all the legal, legislative, regulatory and economic developments that could affect CSBA members and the programs she’s responsible for. Guzman, Rader and the rest of the team also evaluate countless proposals from businesses interested in partnering with CSBA.
“We conduct extensive due diligence before proceeding with any partnership agreement,” says Guzman. “We don’t partner with any business unless it offers a service that is affordable, meets a critical need and is aligned with our mission. A vendor could have the most awesome product on the planet, but if it’s not a good value, we won’t offer it.”
The art of conference planning
 Conference planning is an art—a specialized process that typically begins years before the first attendees pick up their name badges and programs. Deanna Fernandes, who oversees everything from logo-design and hotel contracts to selection of keynote speakers and workshop topics for CSBA’s Annual Education Conference and Trade Show, says she feels a special commitment to the work. “As a parent of a daughter who will enroll in public school for the first time next fall, I feel a personal investment in my job,” she says. “I take these things seriously. I know my job has value.” Members of CSBA’s executive and conference planning committees do the “big picture thinking” necessary to ensure that each conference focuses on issues that are most critical to schools, students and governance teams, Fernandes says. “We really hold true to what the executive team and conference committee decides in terms of content development. But that being said, CSBA staff members have many, many decisions to make—involving both minutiae and the big picture aspects of conference,” she says. “My job is to put on an event that meets the needs of our members, explores the many challenges facing schools, reflects our priorities, showcases our products and services and celebrates what’s going right in public education.”
|
The media are the message A tight-knit team of computer programmers and other information technicians maintains CSBA’s fact-filled and user-friendly website and creates and manages extensive databases to support member services. Bob Edwards was initially hired as a computer troubleshooter to help keep those operations running smoothly, but the association soon realized the musician, composer and self-described lifelong learner had other valuable skills. In recent years he has helped colleagues from many departments take advantage of emerging technology to convey key association messages.
“I’m a full-service shop,” says Edwards, who calls himself a generalist but might more aptly be called a renaissance man. Juggling camera work, sets, lighting, title sequences and graphics duties, he captures and edits footage for CSBA videos. A couple dozen are posted on CSBA’s YouTube channel.
Some build awareness of the vital work of school boards—just watch the ironically titled “No One Cares About Your Child” and wait for the kicker. Others rally support for needed revenues and reforms; see “Fix School Finance,” with its drumbeat in support of “efforts to build a sound, stable and sufficient finance system.” Still others market CSBA products and services, such as the persuasive pitch in “Agenda Online” to “Go Green! Go Online!” to save time, trees and postal costs.
There are other CSBA media, of course, from the magazine you’re reading now to other periodical and custom print publications and the association’s online presence at www.csba.org. The Communications Department’s design team transforms many important but dry-sounding subjects—think Tax and Revenue Anticipation Notes, Medi-Cal billing procedures, or education research—into engaging and readable brochures through imagery that brings the programs and services to life.
The designers’ layouts, mastheads and illustrations are everywhere—on the website; in the monthly newsletter, the quarterly magazine, and the many committee and departmental reports; in conference and workshop programs and brochures; and in frequent social media updates to members via Facebook and Twitter. Headed by Dan DeFoe, CSBA’s artists help tell the story of K-12 public education in California—and they do all that and more while assembling the voluminous guides that help registrants navigate their way through the staggering array of breakout sessions that is typical of CSBA’s Annual Education Conference and Trade Show.
Conferences, workshops and webinars
The Annual Conference draws thousands of school board members, students, school administrators and outside vendors to destination venues in San Francisco or San Diego every year. It takes place over just 2½ days, but the planning and logistics that go into it are a year-round process. Governance consultants and education leadership specialists join with hospitality experts and event planners, working closely with CSBA’s executive and AEC planning committees to craft an event that pays dividends on the time school board members invest with information they can put to use year-round.
And those efforts aren’t just for the Annual Conference, of course: Training workshops for new board members, board presidents and veteran school trustees traverse the state, bringing useful tools of governance within convenient reach at regional events. Even as the association has converted the Back-to-School and Forecast conferences that used to be traveling shows into online webcasts, the training sessions—and, of course, CSBA’s intensive, team-building Masters in Governance Program—benefit from the personal engagement and networking that can only occur when participants meet face to face.
Customer service
Before anyone can take part in those offerings, though, they’ll need to deal with Linda Huntley. She doesn’t give speeches or lead workshops, but she plays a key role in the success of many CSBA events and services. That’s because she handles registrations and oversees invoices and billings for policy products and membership. It’s a detail-oriented job that requires patience, persistence, good organization and people skills, and it puts her on a first-name basis with executive assistants and administrative support staff throughout California. They rely on her to get things right.
“I work really hard to respond to clients’ concerns and questions as quickly as possible,” says Huntley. “I put a huge value on customer service.”
“Staff like Linda are the lifeblood of CSBA—the first point of contact for many of our members,” says Susan Swigart, CSBA assistant executive director of membership and media relations. “The association couldn’t be successful without them.”
Carol Brydolf ( cbrydolf@csba.org ) is a staff writer for California Schools.