North Saint Paul-Maplewood-Oakdale Alert

On Wednesday, January 16th, EMID families found an article in the Star Tribune that alerted us to the fact that the North Saint Paul-Maplewood-Oakdale school board (ISD 622) would consider pulling out of the East Metro Integration District at its meeting on Tuesday, January 22nd. The next day the Pioneer Press also ran a story. We quickly learned that a process that began a little over a month ago in district 622 threatened to tear at the fabric of our EMID family. This is moving way too fast! We are asking the ISD 622 school board to please slow down and take a careful look at the impact leaving EMID would really have.

North Saint Paul-Maplewood-Oakdale set up a committee to investigate the option of leaving EMID in November. The committee first met on December 4th. Most of the public only learned of this committee’s existence the week of January 15th. The 622 board will meet on January 22nd to vote on the proposal. It took over two years to build up the collaboration that became EMID 10 years ago. How can the ISD 622 board throw away 10 years of collaboration on the basis of one month’s consideration?EMID families don’t know what is causing the ISD 622 board to move so precipitously. Here’s what we do know:

  • On December 4th the “EMID Committee” of ISD 622 first met to consider whether the recent Minnesota Department of Education finding that the district was “racially isolated” from the adjoining districts of Mahtomedi and Stillwater should lead district 622 to leave its current collaboration with EMID in order to form its own collaboration with Stillwater and Mahtomedi. Note that though two Crosswinds 10th grade parents were invited to participate in this committee at the last minute, neither family could make the meetings on such short notice and both were later removed from the committee.
  • At its last meeting on January 8th the committee unanimously voted that ISD 622 should pull out of EMID and form it’s own integration collaborative.
  • The “cabinet” of ISD 622 voted unanimously to forward the committee’s recommendation to the board for consideration at the board’s January 22nd meeting.
  • The ISD 622 board met with the committee on January 15th for a “study session” about the proposal. An 86 page study packet (PDF) was used to review the proposal of the committee.
  • The ISD 622 board will meet on Tuesday, January 22nd, at 7pm at the 622 District Center in North High School, 2520 12th Avenue, North Saint Paul.
  • If the ISD 622 board votes to leave EMID, that departure would take effect beginning with the 2009-2010 school year.