Focus groups looking to the future

Kirby will assess how well prepared students are for high school

Kirby Elementary District 140 in Tinley Park plans focus groups, including interviews with current and former students, parents, teachers and community members, in part to assess how prepared students are to enter high school.

Elements of the strategic plan being created are to be put in place before the start of the 2023-2024 school year, according to Superintendent Daniel Callaghan.

Callaghan said he and the board do not anticipate the strategic plan and its recommendations will reveal any serious flaws in how the district is preparing students, but will establish a road map for the district, with the plan being reviewed on a regular basis.

A community survey is also part of the process, and focus group sessions are planned for Feb. 7 and 8, Callaghan said. Results will be analyzed by the district with the help of an outside consultant, and a tentative strategic plan is scheduled to be presented to the school board in May, he said.

Callaghan said the district is kind of at ground zero without an existing strategic plan, but said there is a basic framework in place and “it’s a matter of putting it down on paper and having a common vision.”

Callaghan said the district’s enrollment has held steady at about 3,500 students, serving primarily students from Tinley Park but also Orland Hills and Orland Park. The district has five elementary and two middle schools.

In his 20th year with the district, Callaghan had been director of curriculum and instruction, an assistant principal and principal.

District 140 is working with Schaumburg-based Hazard, Young, Attea, and Associates to conduct the strategic planning process, with the firm responsible for conducting interviews and focus groups and presenting its findings.

The strategic planning committee includes teachers, district administrators and community members, Callaghan said. He said the goal is to get input from a variety of sources.

“I truly believe it is a community effort, not just one person making decisions or seven board members having the final say,” Callaghan said.

The survey, for example, will be available to all district residents, regardless of whether they have students attending district schools.

“Just because you don’t have a child attending Kirby doesn’t mean you don’t have valuable input,” he said.

There will be 26 focus groups, and the results of those sessions and the community survey information will be returned toward the end of February.

“The approach we are taking is research based, which means that decisions come from data rather than intuition,” Callaghan said.