Author Archives: Mary Hess

Board to vote on bleeding EMID dry

Dear EMID Families,

The EMID board has posted its packet of materials for the board meeting taking place this Wednesday, January 25th at 5:30pm at Harambee Elementary School. Among other important pieces of information in that packet, the board will be considering a budget proposal that would reduce funding to EMID in a major way, and to the schools dramatically, using only the “backpack” funding for the schools and sending all of the integration funding to the member districts.

I’m writing to you with two urgent requests.

First, that you write a letter to your board representative ASAP (here are the email addresses for the board: https://wp.clst.org/emidfamilies/board, and the email addresses for the district superintendents: https://wp.clst.org/emidfamilies/superintendents). We have to let them know, BEFORE THE WEDNESDAY MEETING, that we are concerned about the proposals.

Second, that you attend the board meeting this Wednesday. There will not be much opportunity to speak, but just showing up in person will help the board to see how important this is to us. The meeting will begin at 5:30 pm at Harambee.

Here are the points we’ve talked about to stress to board members and superintendents:

  1. It’s not fair to ask the two EMID schools to absorb such huge cuts to their funding. No regular district schools function solely on the basis of “backpack” funding alone. Why should the board require Harambee and Crosswinds to do so?
  2. EMID is still in the process of doing strategic planning, and the Community Council hasn’t met yet. What is the point of adopting a budget before knowing what the strategic plan for spending those integration funds will be?
  3. With schools all over the state being forced to reduce their spending, we know that there will need to be some cuts to the budgets for Harambee and Crosswinds. But these cuts should be made in a sustainable way. That is, the board voted to keep the schools open, and should fund them in a way that makes that possible. Further, the board should NOT be spending down the reserve funds balance. Doing so essentially says the schools will not be open into the future.
  4. As we’ve said over and over again, we need accountability. What are the individual school districts going to be doing with the integration funds the Board proposes to send to them? Where are their plans? Where is the evidence that sending the money to the districts will have a stronger impact than keeping it in the EMID collaborative where all of the districts together are already accomplishing more than they could alone? The state has allocated integration funds to EMID to do integration. We’ve been doing that really well in EMID in ways that have made the two schools, in particular, models not only here in MN, but also nationally. Why take that apart now?

I know that this is a busy time of year, and you’ve already worked hard to keep these schools open. We won that victory, but if we can’t keep the funds flowing to the schools, that victory won’t mean much in the long run. Please write to your board representative, and to the superintendent of your home district, and urge them to ask the EMID Board to seek other ways to manage their funds.

– Mary Hess

Get involved: Key action steps

As you have all heard, the EMID Board of Directors is soon going to be voting on whether or not to close Harambee and Crosswinds. Yesterday a group of parents met to discuss this situation and what we can do to protect our schools. Mary Hess sent an e-mail earlier today with reflections on this meeting and a call for everyone to come together to help with this effort.

At the meeting we developed a series of strategies we believe will help to save our schools. These strategies are listed below. Please continue to watch your e-mail and wp.clst.org/emidfamilies for updates on this situation. Also, please let us know if you would like to get involved in this effort. We need as many voices as possible. We will continue to post here as we have updates on what we’re doing, and how you can help. Thank you.

Save Crosswinds and Harambee — Strategies:

  1. Develop a petition in support of EMID schools.
  2. Get as many parents, students, and Harambee and Crosswinds community members to upcoming Board work sessions and meetings.
    • A handout explaining the situation and providing the dates, times, and locations of meetings will be available at back to schools nights at Crosswinds and Harambee.
    • Work with high school students to encourage them to attend Board meetings and serve as a voice for EMID.
    • A sign-in sheet will be available at back-to-school night to gather names, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses of interested families.
  3. Develop talking points for parents and student to use as a guide when communicating with Board members.
  4. Reach out to teachers and staff to let them know parents are doing all we can. Parents at back to school night will speak to teachers one-on-one and ask them how we can support them.
  5. Develop a library of stories and pictures which will showcase the accomplishments of EMID students. These stories and photos will be shared with Board members prior to, or at, the September Board meetings and will include the following:
    • testimony about what EMID has meant for individuals
    • Photos from EMID successes such as the Orchestra trip to New York, “The Wiz,” World Affairs Challenge, etc.
  6. Connect with constituents outside Crosswinds/Harambee community to gain their support as well as additional information. These include:
    • Board members
    • Education Commissioner’s office
    • WMEP families
    • Education Minnesota
  7. Survey families to see where they would go if EMID schools closed. Some of the member districts think closing the schools would bring the students back to their districts and this survey will help to understand whether or not this would happen.
  8. Share the story of the Board activities with media
    • Invite media to a future board meeting to showcase students and families and highlight the actions the Board is considering.
    • Encourage families to write letters to the editor and commentaries for newspapers.
  9. Meet on Saturday, September 10 at 9:00 a.m. to discuss progress and prepare for September 14 work session. We will be meeting at 1993 Lincoln Avenue, Saint Paul, MN 55105. Call Mary Hess at 651-236-7592 or email mhess@luthersem.edu for directions. Teachers will be invited to join parents at this meeting.If you have any additional ideas please share them with the group by commenting on this post, or emailing the group at families@emidfamilies.org.Thank you for your help and support in this process.Susan Larson

Update from August 27 meeting

Twelve parents and students met yesterday afternoon (Saturday, August 27th) on very short notice to strategize around the current threat to close the EMID schools. We have put together a number of action steps which we will outline here as soon as we can. We agreed that there is still hope for keeping the schools open — both in the immediate short term and in the longer term — but the next six weeks will be crucial. All of us need to get as many people as we can to the next board meetings (details will be posted here as soon as we confirm them), and we all need to write to the board members and tell them we will not stand idly by as they consider closing our schools. Also — let our teachers know how much we respect them and care about what they do with our students! We will meet again on September 10th at 9 am, at  1993 Lincoln Avenue, Saint Paul, MN 55105. Call Mary Hess at 651-236-7592 or email mhess@luthersem.edu for directions.