Fort Worth ISD is working on a plan to improve itself.
The district has started working on a strategic plan, a document of goals that will guide decision making. The plan is expected to address issues such as the district’s funding problems, student achievement and post-pandemic issues.
Officials expect the plan to be completed by April, which is when the school board will consider its adoption.
David Saenz, chief of strategic initiatives and partnerships, described the strategic plan as Fort Worth ISD and its community working together to build a better future.
“We will use this as guideposts for the future,” Saenz told the school board on Aug. 22.
What’s the timeline?
Fort Worth ISD plans to spend the next seven months talking to parents, students, staff and residents about what they see as the district’s priorities. Their feedback will become the base of the district’s new strategic plan. Here’s what to expect:
- August-September: School board kicks off strategic planning process and new committees formed.
- October-December: Community advisory committees will discuss the plan.
- December-February: Internal teams form plans to take action based on strategic plan.
- March: Broader community sends feedback on strategic plan.
- April: School board adopts strategic plan.
During the next seven months, Fort Worth ISD plans to talk to parents, students, staff and residents about what they see as their goals for their school district. Superintendent Angélica Ramsey’s advisory committees — which include more than 50 parents, according to administrators — and other internal groups also will help shape the strategic plan.
“The process will see broad input from the larger community,” Saenz said.
The plan will establish high-level priorities for Fort Worth ISD, show a path to achieving them and have an accountability system allowing residents to see progress. Other governmental entities, such as the city of Fort Worth’s economic development-focused document, have strategic plans.
The school board approved a $180,000 contract with Boston-based education consulting firm District Management Group to help with the strategic-planning process. The firm previously worked on the district’s evaluation of how it used federal pandemic funds and led a retreat for the Learning and Leading Department.
District Management Group is expected to do some of the more technical work, including drafting and publishing the actual strategic plan and developing a public progress monitoring dashboard.
Trustee Tobi Jackson questioned whether Saenz sees any challenges ahead. The chief did not see any, Saenz said. He pointed out that the plan already has a solid foundation because it will partly be based on Ramsey’s listening tour from her few months as superintendent.
The end goal is not to just produce a document, Saenz said.
“It’s a document that we should keep going and it’s a plan that we keep iterating as we go year to year,” he said.
Jacob Sanchez is an enterprise journalist for the Fort Worth Report. Contact him at jacob.sanchez@fortworthreport.org or via Twitter. At the Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independently of our board members and financial supporters. Read more about our editorial independence policy here.
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