New St. Charles District 303 superintendent plans listening sessions with the community

New St. Charles Unit District 303 Superintendent Paul Gordon wants to hear what the community has to say.

During Saturday's St. Charles school board retreat, Scott Harvey, the district's new chief communications officer, discussed the district's proposed community engagement plan, involving listening sessions. Both Harvey and Gordon started with the district this month.

Gordon had previously served as the superintendent of the Wenatchee School District in Wenatchee, Washington. Before that, he served as superintendent for Glen Ellyn Elementary District 41 for six years.

He succeeds Jason Pearson, who left the district to become the superintendent of Northbrook School District 28.

Harvey succeeds Carol Smith, who had been with the district since 2017. She left the district to become the new executive director of communications for Glenbrook High School District 225.

"It's important for Paul certainly to make a connection with our community in the early days and myself as well," Harvey said. "It's going to be really important that we have feedback from our community, not just feedback that we've had to date that others have presented to us, but that we have that one-on-one feedback from conversations with them."

The listening sessions, which will take place in different areas of the community, are set to begin in mid- to late August.

Another round of listening sessions will take place at the end of the year, with a third round scheduled for next spring.

"The goals are to introduce ourselves to the community and get a baseline understanding of the community's satisfactions with the district but also the need for improvement," Harvey said.

That information can be used in helping develop the district's strategic plan, he said.

"In some respects, the community is going to have a lot more information and background on this district than Paul and I do," Harvey said. "We need to listen to that. It's not a time for us to come with ideas or suggestions. We need to hear from them first before we can make determinations on how to move forward."

The district plans to continue the conversations on an ongoing basis.

"We don't just want this to be a one-off," he said. "I think to gain some trust, to learn and engage on a more consistent basis, we need to be able to come back to that same group of people or new community members the next time around, and share with them what we've learned and how we plan to proceed or how we are proceeding."

Gordon said the idea "is to engage with our community."

"Another goal here is this healing idea. I don't care where you are at in education, COVID has polarized our communities. It's time for us to come together. It's time for us to have conversations.

"What we learned through COVID, maybe what we forgot, is how important school districts are to communities. Oftentimes, we are that lighthouse that brings people together. That's what this is really about, bringing people together, having those conversations, meeting with people who may not always have your same perspective, which I think is one of the most important things we can do."

Making sure diverse voices are heard is another goal, Gordon said.

"It's really important that we're hearing from all of our families and all their unique experiences," he said.

Board member Becky McCabe said she would like the district to reach out to teachers and staff members.

"I think as a board, we don't have opportunities to really hear from teachers," McCabe said. "So I would encourage us to use this in a way that we could also hear from teachers and staff as well."