Terresa Monroe of Noisyroom.net and I made suggestions to improve the Carson City School District’s Web site Tuesday night during the school board meeting. Suggestions included posting secondary class syllabi, union contract, school budget, listing district payments, and digitalizing newsletters to parents.

It would be an understatement to say some board members were not very receptive to the idea of opening up information to the public. The knee-jerk reaction that it would cost a lot of money was immediately thrown out as an excuse. Tech savvy people know better and readily recognize it as uninformed objections or purposeful distractions. The quality and control of information concern was thrown into the hopper as a further distraction. If district employees are trusted with paper communications, why should they not be trusted with digital communications? What is the difference?

Increased communication with the community and parents is listed as the primary goal of school districts in their mission statements. Currently school districts spend massive amounts on paper handouts and newsletters given to students to take home. Sometimes they get home, sometimes they don’t. What is the cost to copy these handouts, one side in English and the other in Spanish, versus parents having the option to receive them by e-mail in either language? Isn’t it more convenient for parents to save school information on their computer by e-mail rather than being lost in a pile of papers on their kitchen counter or desk?

Of course a common objection is not all people have a computer, e-mail, or Internet connection. Did we wait until everybody had telephone numbers before asking for or using them? Of course not, and parents can still have the CHOICE to receive hardcopy handouts and newsletters.

In addition to saving money, technology can truly make public schools transparent. That’s the real objection. What would happen if everybody could see what was taught and emphasized in classes? What would happen if the public could see biased, one-sided supplementary information was being forced on students? What would happen if the public had access with a mouse click to the union contract, budget, and disbursement checks? It would be chaos, bedlam, and the end of the world as we know it, at least in the view of some in power.

To prevent this, districts have developed some tricks of the trade. A common one is to post information so it is difficult to find. In this way the district can claim it is on the site, but knowing full well most people wouldn’t be able to find it. Another trick, among many, is to not publish board members’ e-mails and instead filter them through the superintendent.

It was at least agreed to do a needs assessment survey for the Carson City School District’s Web site. Check out your school district’s Web site. How could it be improved in terms of transparency and usability? Are the e-mails for school board members and administrators clearly displayed? Is your school district’s Web site a window or a wall?

Joe Enge
Chairman, EdWatch Nevada
Education Analyst, Nevada Policy Research Institute

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.
George Orwell

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