Survey shows record District 303 satisfaction, but middle schools lag

The results of the latest St. Charles schools community survey puts a positive cap on more than a year of public debates and major decisions. About 12,000 District 303 parents, staff and students gave the district and its officials record high marks in the online survey conducted in December.

District staff shared the results with school board members Tuesday night. Dave Chiszar, the district's executive director of research and accountability, showed results that parents gave teachers, schools, curriculum, buildings, administration, the superintendent and school board grades of four or better on a five-point scale. The marks for teachers, administration, Superintendent Don Schlomann and the school board are all new highs.

Chiszar said that's remarkable given the many months of sometimes contentious debate about the future of the district's middle schools. The board concluded that debate by deciding to close Haines Middle School and borrow $15 million to upgrade Wredling Middle School and do an extensive remodeling on Thompson Middle School.

"The point is, with all the things going on, that got people involved, excited, upset and stirred emotion," Chiszar said. "It shows people appreciated being included and involved in all the discussions. It bodes well that the ratings are so high."

Individual programs also received a stellar report from parents in the survey. A total of 14 out of 16 programs, ranging from reading to guidance, hit all-time marks for satisfaction. Only science and family and consumer science showed a drop or no improvement in satisfaction scores.

Chiszar speculated that the spotlight district staff put on old science labs at the district's middle schools pushed the neutral of lower scores. That thought also seemed to play out in one chart showing a plummeting satisfaction score related to the middle school environment. The environment score reflects everything from the cleanliness of schools to how welcoming a building feels. The environmental satisfaction score for middle schools dropped nearly a full point (from 4.53 last year to 3.61).

Chiszar called the drop an anomaly.

"It's reflecting the work of what we've done in educating people on what we want to do with the middle schools."

The staff portion of the survey results saw some retooling to make questions clearer. That makes the most recent poll the new baseline for future staff responses. The first year showed the lowest for shared decision making and collaboration at the elementary schools. Both categories rated below three on a four-point scale.

Schlomann said the scores are reflective of the number of different leaders at the district's 12 elementary schools.

"It looks like staff is probably pretty happy with leadership right now on the high school level and pretty happy with principals at the middle school level, but there may be some diversity of opinions on that at the elementary school level."

Schlomann said not to read too much into the staff survey results in the first year of new questions. Next year will reveal more actionable information through comparison, he said.