- Which of the four phases (described in Chapter 4) do you believe will provide the greatest challenges in your school district? Why? What steps can be taken to improve the success of the activities in that particular phase?
My school district is actually pretty well organized, and I think many of these areas would be relatively easy to organize, document and implement. Easy might not be the right word because it certainly is a lot of work, and detailed work, but I think my district is in good shape to take something like this on. I think the biggest challenge for my district might be steps 13 and 14 within Phase III, which involves planning and documenting the future state. When you work with partner agencies as closely as we do, there are times when visions don’t necessarily line up, or laws and policies change and affect us in unforeseen ways. I’ve talked about my district’s partnership with probation because that is who I work with most, but other sites have partnerships with non-profit organizations (Monarch School) and other social services (San Pasqual Academy: residential facility for foster youth). Balancing not one but several partnerships, very different ones at that, makes planning a future state of an EA challenging but not impossible.
Steps that can be taken to meet that challenge include having a strong, working relationship with those agencies with clear communication channels in place. Having a role within the EA to monitor potential changes to the operation or relationship with these partners, and some sort of liaison between your district and their management, would also improve the chance of success of your EA.
Steps that can be taken to meet that challenge include having a strong, working relationship with those agencies with clear communication channels in place. Having a role within the EA to monitor potential changes to the operation or relationship with these partners, and some sort of liaison between your district and their management, would also improve the chance of success of your EA.