MOULTRIE, Ga. – In Colquitt County’s search for a new school superintendent, more work than usual is taking place when it comes to seeking public input.

As the county’s Board of Education posted a community survey on what qualifications for a superintendent are most important, the Moultrie-Colquitt County Development Authority put out its own feelers in an attempt to address what the stakeholders believe needs to change in local public education. In partnership with the Georgia Electrical Membership Corporation Community Development Division, the MCCDA began the Parents Perspectives Project months ago and presented its initial findings to the BOE at its October meeting.

This project, which picked up momentum after current superintendent Doug Howell announced his plans to retire after the 2020-21 school year, consisted of two parts: a survey and a series of facilitated sessions. With pages upon pages of listed concerns and suggestions on a range of educational topics, the next step for the MCCDA is another series of sessions for community input on the superintendent search.

“A small working group of us from the (Development Authority) and BOE, and Mr. Sampson with Georgia School Boards Association, chatted (Oct. 26) with the Carl Vinson Institute about hosting community sessions for engagement,” said Barbara Grogan, MCCDA president. “We are brainstorming through the logistics of doing so and being careful with COVID and group gatherings.”

Grogan said the Authority is taking these steps at the behest of the business community that wants to be active and engaged in major decisions like a new school superintendent.

“The Authority wants to be a very big partner with the education system,” she said. “They’ve allowed us to be. If you don’t have a workforce, that hurts industry. You want to have good industry so that people coming out of the school system have good opportunities for jobs, too.”

“As a board, we appreciate input from the community,” said BOE Chairman Robby Pitts. “Our first priority is child safety, and then seeing that they get a quality education. We do what is feasibly possible to act upon (suggestions). Somethings are unobtainable, but we try to change what we can.”

The origins of the Parents Perspectives Project began well before Howell’s announcement. Grogan said members of the community had been contacting the MCCDA about ideas they had, and in 2019  she first made contact with Mary Beth Watson, who was the board chairman at the time.

“The first (recommendation) was to get some of our leadership with the school system talking directly with these parents because they have the content knowledge,” said Grogan, admitting that by no means is she an education expert. “We just met (with) assistant superintendents who could answer some of these key questions. We’re going to have a couple of meetings back with these same people.”

With the parents and those in business, Grogan said the objective is to pick a superintendent who matches the community of Colquitt County. That will be facilitated through community input sessions. They will involve parents, teachers and industry leaders all giving input as there is a two-pronged approach to the job of running a school system.

“The school board will have to look from a technical skill side,” said Grogan. “Do they have the right degree, the right certification? The community can give insight that it’s important to us that this person be engaged with the community, with the parents. They can tell what’s important from that side. Hopefully the school board will have a candidate that can do both. Whoever’s going to be the superintendent, it’s hard to wear all those hats.”

The COVID-19 pandemic brings about the need for multiple input sessions; on Friday Gov. Brian Kemp extended his executive order which limits numbers in public gatherings. Grogan said there are places big enough to adhere with social distancing requirements such as Withers Auditorium and the Arts Center Ball Room, plus gymnasiums at schools.

Using guidelines from the National Educators Association, the MCCDA prepared a survey with 25 questions asking responders to strategically think about the changes needed in the public school system. This survey was sent via email to 113 addresses of people who had previously expressed a desire to be more engaged in addressing these topics. The net response was 55.

On five dates in July, the MCCDA hosted facilitated sessions with no more than 10 attendees each time; the invitations were made to those from the original list of email addresses. From the survey results, these attendees were presented a list of 15 topics of greatest concern and asked to rank each one in order of most importance to them. The MCCDA took the top seven topics and, in its Parents Perspective Project presentation, spelled out the notes on the top seven issues with listed concerns plus possible solutions for these issues.

The No. 1 issue, with five pages worth of listed concerns: Leadership.

Next was expectations, either from the educator towards students or for the educators themselves. Also in the top seven are teachers being fully prepared, class size, pathway for advanced placement, bullying and inconsistencies between schools.

Pitts said there were no surprises in what he read, and the biggest takeaway for him was the need for improved communication between schools and parents.

“Effective communication can clear up a lot,” he said. “If we can communicate our motives, our methods, it would ease a lot of minds. We are working on that.”

“I was encouraged,” said Grogan. “There were no negative disparaging scenarios. If they say we think we need different leadership style, I would say ‘Where? Give me ideas how. Be thoughtful and creative about this.’ You can’t say you don’t like a person. That doesn’t help things. Tell us how we can change some of this. They would give us ideas, too.”

Grogan pointed out the small pocket sample against the more than 9,000 children in the system. Others might have different thoughts, so she stressed not looking at these results as a representation of the whole. Each school has a Governance Council, and this information she believes could be worked in at their future meetings.

The Georgia EMC participation was in the form of facilitating the project, Grogan said, and the Community Development Division has people trained in this area.

“Jenny Robbins (GMC Community Development manager) helped me do design, helped getting people talking,” she said.

The application process for the Colquitt school superintendent position closed Oct. 25, according to Pitts. He said the Georgia School Board Association received and vetted the applicant information, and then in the next two weeks local school officials will meet with the GSBA.