McHenry Times

The Community Unit School District 300 board of education held a meeting on upcoming events and district policies.

“So this was a presentation we did last year that we want to talk about, you know, how do we best problem solve and address needs in our schools with our students, with our families?” Superintendent Susan Harkin said during the meeting. “So just as a reminder, we do have a chain of command policy that I'm required to provide as part of our board policy. I develop an organizational chart which is on the district website indicating the channels of authority and reporting relationship.”

The board provides a Livestream of its meeting on YouTube.

Sheila Crotty-Kagan, the director of fine arts, was able to come to the meeting and speak about an exciting upcoming event. The district will be celebrating the 50th annual D300 Choral Festival, which includes all 8th grade choir students from all five middle schools, along with chamber choirs from all three high schools.

In honor of the 50th anniversary, the district has commissioned a grant funded two new pieces of music to be debuted at the event. The event will be at 7 p.m. on October 17th.

The board noted it has an approximately $200 million budget for the 2022 fiscal year and an approximately $300 million budget for the next year.

Shelley Nacke, the chief of family education services, presented on the importance of family engagement in a student’s academic career alongside the school system. She stressed the importance of getting parents involved in building booster clubs, like athletics or fine arts booster clubs.

In terms of district level engagement, she discussed the Family and Community Network which supports and educates parents on how to support their students. She gave an overview of a couple other parent engagement opportunities throughout the district.

The board will meet again at 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 25 at District 300’s central office on 2550 Harnish Drive in Algonquin.

In the last part of her report, Superintendent Harkin discussed the district’s chain of communication. She explained that when there is a problem, the policy is to start with the person closest to the problem, so if it’s an issue in the classroom, talk to the teacher.

She reminded everyone that dealing with the problem as closely as possible is the most likely way to systemically solve the problem successfully, though there is a chain of higher ups that can be involved in situations as severity or continuity increases.